


At Last

by Good_Evening



Category: Guardians of Childhood - William Joyce, Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Abandonment, Blood and Gore, Broken Jack, Broken Pitch, Character Death, Contracts, Depression, Dubious Consent, Extremely Dubious Consent, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Miscarriage, Mpreg, Mutual Pining, Touch-Starved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-27
Updated: 2014-11-12
Packaged: 2018-01-17 05:15:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 11
Words: 38,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1375111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Good_Evening/pseuds/Good_Evening
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jack would do anything for children, loves Jamie to death, but humans are too delicate to handle most of what he's capable of. He wants someone he can dote on with his whole being. There's only one spirit out there able (and willing) to help him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Politics Makes Strange Bedfellows

**Author's Note:**

> Note the switch from present to past. It's important or something.
> 
> Fast updates, fun story. Fun for now. For now.

Jack ghosts over the entrance in the Earth every time he passes through Burgess. He doesn’t have the will to appear to the children, barely managing a brief snowstorm before tucking into the wood to be alone.

Jamie grows distant as he seems to disappear, and finally stops seeing him altogether. The feeling strikes him while flying, sudden and quick. There is no warning, no fanfare for his pain. He feels Jamie’s belief slip from his heart and screams, losing hold on the wind and tumbling to the ground, landing hard on the ice below. The air is knocked out of him and he can’t even struggle. His mouth cracks open in a soundless gasp, body convulsing in slow motion on the forest floor. Tears freeze over his cheeks and he clutches his chest once he finds the strength. As he slowly regains control, he curls into himself, guarding his belly, hands creeping under his sweater to feel the soft, flat skin. His sobs are sparse and choked, back shaking as he grips the cold, lifeless flesh.

His sorrows are loud enough to summon company. The shadows lengthen in his anguish, flicking at the edge of his vision.

Pitch slips from behind a tree, the darkness lethargic around him; exhausted. His form is out of place in the wonderland around them. The world is quiet but for Jack’s crying, and Pitch stays restrained at too far a distance, deafened and numbed by the broken sound.

“Well?” he asks lowly. His voice is hoarse, eyes too tired to carry their usual fire. If anything, he looks like he’s about to collapse. Jack buries his face in his knees and holds his stomach tighter, sobs soft. He tries to make himself smaller but Pitch growls,

“What are you doing, Jack?”

Then softer, tired again,

“Why do you keep coming here?”

Jack lifts his face enough to look up, eyes shadowed and wet. His cheeks are sharp and tinged purple, not round and pink. He looks like a dead boy curled and gone to sleep. The thought tugs at Pitch and he wants to hide, to leave. He won’t face this now.

The voice is cracking, wrecked, but he still aches to hear it.

“I can’t feel him!” Jack sobs and the need is beautifully clear, and Pitch so wants to acknowledge him.

Both of them have felt loss. Both of them have searched for something more and found only pain. Pitch turns to leave, but his pace is slow as he drifts back toward the frozen maw. He looks over his shoulder, and Jack has already folded in again.

“You may follow.”

The shadows help to tug him up, but he still can’t stand, so Pitch backtracks and lifts him carefully into his arms. The weight is wrong; he’s too light, frail enough to be damaged. But Pitch holds him close and pretends he hasn’t changed, that nothing's happened. He tucks the boy’s head under his chin and murmurs over the crunch of ice,

“It’s alright, Jack, you’re alright.”

 

* * *

 

Bunny is a spirit of Spring, of fertility and new life. Jack couldn’t help but feel a bit out of place in the Warren, even if he did his part to freeze the dying pools as kids went tumbling by. The warmth was a bit much for him, and he lingered in the shade, more often than not. His ice sculptures didn’t melt instantly, there. Being the Guardian of Fun, he couldn’t help but joke around with it, and put on the poshest, most arrogant accent he can when he sneaked up behind Bunny in the dark.

“ _Hello, old friend.”_

Bunny about jumped out of his own skin. Fur.

After a day of lounging down in the green, escaping the summer heat above, Jack wondered about his predicament. The Guardian of Fun was the most exciting one of all; the most lively. Winter was the best season, hands down, and the kids loved every minute of it. The few kids that believed in him, even more so. He wanted to spend all the time he can with them, but he only had a few months.

He felt guilty, wasting his time visiting other Guardians. They certainly didn’t go out of their way to see him. The new guy. And when his season was furthest from his grasp, he felt entirely displaced. The southern hemisphere simply didn’t have the population he needs. Feeling welcomed in all corners of the world seemed to be a plus of being a Guardian, but not one he’d had the pleasure of experiencing. Winter, however much he loved it, certainly has its negative connotations.

How many kids have been lost to a blizzard on an egg hunt? Gotten frostbite from opening a Christmas present? Gone to sleep for the Tooth Fairy and frozen to death?

Jack has killed more people, mostly by accident, in his 300 years than several wars put together. In his effort to bring joy and beauty he inevitably, unconsciously, murders.

He did try to be gentle, but the blizzards come to him by nature, and nature is impossible to control. His desires to be seen, to be acknowledged, led to some very miserable situations for humans, he would admit, but they can’t know a loneliness of three hundred years. They can’t know the emptiness of his isolation, the fact that he couldn’t hold Jamie for long without making him shiver and pull away. None of the Guardians could ever understand his laments.

None of them could understand going without family for so long.

And Jamie, Jamie was brilliant, Jamie was his light, his first friend, his first believer.

But Jamie was human, and humans are very delicate.

Jack wanted something of his own. Not a palace or minions or sentient eggs. He wanted someone to talk to him where no one else could, who would chase him to Antarctica or mountain peaks and not tremble from the cold. Whom he could hold and comfort without fear of harm.

He wouldn’t say his Guardianhood alienated other Winter spirits, but they had no interest in him prior to it, and it inspired no allegiance.

Most of the spirit world, in fact, seems to hold a similar opinion of the club: if they’re not a part of it, it doesn’t faze them. And so his isolation was carved deeper.

He asked Bunny, one day, with two daisies over his eyes to block out the light, if a wisp can make new wisps.

“Only Manny can do that.”

Jack sat up, the flowers falling, laced with filigree ice,

“But some were here before. How did we reproduce without him?”

Bunny didn’t blink,

“… S’not been done since before Manny got here.”

“So it’s possible?”

“I…” He seemed unwilling to answer, afraid to disappoint, but he scratched his neck and thumped his leg, “I don’t know, Jack. Only life can beget life.”

Jack was quiet, his smile losing its usual gleam. He toyed with the daises and plucked their brittle petals.

“Oh. Yeah. I forgot.”

He wanted very much to forget.

 

* * *

 

Soliciting someone like Eros or Ishtar to help him may have been smarter, but Jack simply wasn’t that type. While he gobbled up friends whenever they come, pursuing anyone so old, so hard to reach, was a little unnerving. At the time, he wasn’t even sure how to go about it. Which is why his next choice, while surely not the most appropriate, seemed the best.

He flew back to Burgess, left a snowstorm at Jamie’s door, and prowled through the howling woods for the gap in the Earth.

Pitch wouldn’t mind a few questions, at least. After the obligatory pleasantries.

The wind can’t be summoned below the surface, so Jack fell as gracefully as he could into the darkness, lips thin as he tumbled further and further down. The world assembled itself around him, the darkness absolute and curious. The cavern lurched fully into being as he touched down gently on white stone, smoky edges of the rock swirling into view. The caves had never been so vague in their shape. He remembered Pitch being all edges, stark and defiant. The new realm around him was ethereal; more suggestive of form than solid at all.

He guarded his staff out of habit as shadows began stirring on the walls.

“ _You’re holding your breath. How flattering_.”

Jack tensed and tried to squash his frown, taking a short breath to prove Pitch wrong.

“Don’t be formal on my account. Please, relax.” The stone in front of him swirled with darkness and he tucked his foot back, standing straighter as shadows rose from the floor. Pitch was as bony as he’d last seen him, but the hem of his robe floated off and dissipated, giving the appearance of a trail. The sleeves tapered from fabric into shadow, the line between indefinite. He was barely holding himself together. Jack, unfortunately, could understand.

Pitch lifted his chin, hands clasped in front with a disinterested sneer,

“Well?”

Jack forgot to speak. The older spirit lofted a brow as his voice finally crackled into being. It felt faraway, almost useless,

“I want to know something,” he said, trying to be firm as he stared up under his eyelashes. Pitch frowned at his sincerity and crossed his arms,

“How perfectly suspicious,” he smiled, lifting an airy hand, “Go on. Ask away.”

Jack kneaded his staff and opened his mouth, but the words were clunky and hoarse,

“You’re…” he struggled valiantly, but the idea embarrassed him, “You’re older than Manny. Right?”

Pitch’s sneer wavered between angry and entertained. Jack had to squint to see him right. His features blurred as he moved, as if he weren’t really there.

“I have always been, Jack. Is that all?”

“No,”

Jack replied too quickly. He said the first thing that came to mind,

“Have you ever had a kid?” The question was earnest, and Jack needed to know. If Pitch could do it, he could do it.

He wasn’t sure if he’d ever asked a crueler thing. For a brief second, Pitch looked broken, stunned; as though Jack had just stabbed him and licked the blood from the dagger. Alarmingly fast, his expression quieted and his guard went up. The edges of his cloak snapped more insistently into reality, laid flat on the stone floor.

“Why do you ask?”

The moment of truth.

“I, I want to know if it’s possible. If you’ve done it. If spirits can do it.”

Pitch regarded him much more carefully than when he’d come in, arrogance and parlor tricks scaled down to something minute.

“Under proper conditions, yes. We can reproduce.” His tone came back to normal as he prodded nastily, “Why, Jack. Have you found someone to settle down with, then? The perfect fairytale ending?”

Jack blinked,

“Do I need someone?”

He hadn’t given good thought to the idea of bringing someone else in on it. Snow bunnies and ice dragons simply formed at his will, and he at Manny’s. Pitch was elusive in his explanation, distancing himself with a few steps toward the bridge.

“It would take an extraordinary amount of power to form a new, complete being. Shadows, alone, require effort you’ve never known.”

Ignoring the insult, Jack followed him and continued, excited to have found a possible end to his goal,

“So you have done it? If there were two spirits, could they make a complete spirit? Would it have to grow up?” Too trigger-happy to care, he fired questions one after another at Pitch, each more breathless and demanding than the last. Pitch turned slowly, faced him fully, a wicked smile creeping over grey lips,

“You want a child?”

“I mean, well, if that’s what it would be,” Jack stumbled, cheeks purple and knuckles white from the thrill. He looked up, stars in his eyes, “Yeah,” he said, panting a little, too happy, “I guess I want a kid.”

Pitch stared him down as if he were the craziest, funniest thing he’d ever seen, then pivoted and began skulking across the bridge.

“Then all you’ll have to do is find a living partner to contribute.”

Jack’s smile faded and his heart shuddered to a stop,

“Living?”

Pitch glanced over his shoulder,

“Oh my, yes. Wisps can carry, but they cannot impregnate. You would have to find a human, or a god, who would deem you worth the fifteen minutes.”

“You’re not a wisp.”

That stumped Pitch. Jack, if he were a bit more adept, may have noticed the evil shiver that crawled through the shadows. But he pursued him ecstatically, ignorant of the consequences.

“I will not take part in a _child_ , thank you.”

“You don’t have to. Just help me. You’ll never have to see me again.”

He understood Jack’s desperation. Jack didn’t. He faced the boy with a smug grin, a feral cat coming upon his prey,

“Well. Since you asked so _nicely_ ,”

 

* * *

 

The processes were varied, with dangers and benefits accompanying each. Jack had expected some sort of incantation, a squealing goat nailed to the floor with Pitch circling him, painting his body with symbols in its blood. Well, perhaps not that satanic, but he hadn’t thought it would appear so simple. Pitch addressed him clinically, as if he didn’t really want to be there. He told him to stand his ground, that what he was going to do was going to hurt worse than having someone walk through him. Jack could hardly fathom it. Pitch standing in front of him, hand raised, was the last thing he could remember.

A strange crawling feeling, like being caught in a hive, overtook him. He shook off the shadows creeping upon him and saw Pitch looming above, clearly irritated. The pain had knocked him out. Desire for new life was easy enough, but granting his wish would apparently require much more than he’d wagered.

The usual sensation of being ripped apart, sure, but then Pitch had gone and tried to _put_ something there; to replace something in him. Everything under his skin felt charred and immobile. Mouth dry, tongue tight and teeth clenched, he could barely gasp the words out,

“ _What… was that?_ ”

Pitch’s form was less sure, once more, the fringe of his being filtering in and out of existence. Truly, he didn’t want to be there, but his tone was quite bored, and all too clear in Jack’s ringing head.

“I thought this might happen. This way is too difficult. A shame.”

Jack grimaced, picking himself up, piece by piece. He wondered if he could leave anything behind; being fragmented always left a spirit wondering.

“I can do it.”

Pitch’s noncommittal hum pricked his ears and turned his grimace to a frown.

“Well, then, let’s get to it.”

Without warning, he plunged his hand into Jack’s belly, pale fingers immediately tearing at his wrist and robe. Jack was delirious from the pain, the emptiness; Pitch’s own effort to complete it. The boy’s legs failed him and Pitch let him fall, flexing his hand with an agitated energy. If Jack wanted it, so be it. But he would damn well take it like a _Guardian_ , whatever that meant.

So Pitch stalked up again, and shivered at how Jack tried to crawl away.


	2. All's Fair

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's always a way, but not necessarily a will.

Their first session left Jack trembling and hollow. Pitch escorted him to the surface and abandoned him in a drift not far from Jamie’s, a courtesy the wisp was not conscious enough to appreciate. Sprawled in the snow, he watched the wind whisk the boughs above him into a screeching frenzy. It had been looking for him. The snowstorm was the last it had seen of him. As its deft little breezes combed his heated skin, brushing ice through the sweat in his hair, he allowed the exhaustion of the day’s attempts to overcome him, and sighed as he fell asleep.

 

* * *

 

_It’s wrong._

_Everything is cold._

_That same emptiness. He rips off the sheets and stumbles from the bed, hiding in the darkest corner he can find. North’s workshop is caught in Polar Day; the light filters stubbornly through the curtains and Jack claws at his belly through gasping sobs. He tears out his hair and chokes from the lingering pain, doubling over on the cold floor and welcoming the chill as he heaves. But there is nothing left inside._

 

* * *

 

Having woken in the drift, Jack meandered lazily through the wood, sliding down the hill toward Jamie’s to greet him. The boy was at work in his room, bent over school books and a laptop and though normally, Jack would at least rap on the window to give him a smile, now, he didn’t want to disturb him in the slightest. He wasn’t sure he could summon the will for it.

Ever the critic, the wind boosted him up and drove him through the sky, seeking to infuse some of its bounty with his frail state, but the howl of the gust only rang in his chest, and he knew he would have to return to the caves.

 

* * *

 

“How long does it take?” Jack asked, posing in front of a mirror and pondering his metamorphosis. Pitch lingered in the background, pretending not to smile.

“What part?”

Jack lifted his shirt and slapped his smooth, white belly, gaining Pitch’s undivided attention. The man flicked him a deadly glare and turned toward a bookcase.

“All of it. How long ‘til it happens, how long ‘til it comes. All of it.”

They had yet to begin their second session; Jack’s recovery time was not ideal, and it had taken several days before he had even spoken of the first incident.

“It varies. But once it’s taken to you, it may need years to fully form. Whole beings are not a cakewalk. These things take time.”

Unenthusiastic about renting himself for that long, Jack groaned and dropped the fabric, rubbing his face and stretching as much as he could.

“Alright,” he said, trying to mask his fear. Pitch stared him straight on as if he were an idiot. As if. “We should get started, yeah?” His voice wavered and his smile was flickering and false. The man approached and it took too much willpower not to shrink back.

“Yes,” Pitch grinned, holding out his hand, “Let’s.”

 

* * *

 

Jack was not sure if he could take much more of this. The more he focused, the more he could feel Pitch’s fingers twisting inside of him, searching, trying to burrow in and leave something strange behind. He held in his screams to collapse at the end of each attempt, moaning and sometimes retching on the floor; back bare to the heat of the caves and face piqued from the dead blood rushing to save him.

This process evoked every fear, every survival instinct he’d ever had the misfortune of uncovering. Pain was not something he could actively fight, and he hadn’t the energy to pull Pitch’s hand away when he wanted him to stop. He wasn’t sure how long it took before he inevitably fell, but by the third try, that afternoon, Pitch was clearly irritated and eager to move forward without the fainting spells. Convinced that he could handle it, that the pain would lessen a little each time, Jack continued, offering himself to Pitch’s uncompromising grip on his innards. He was foolish, and Pitch told him so frequently.

“I did warn you,” he offered innocently, brusquely as Jack stumbled on standing. He refused to help him up, but allowed the boy to steady himself, so long as he didn’t tug the robe.

“I know,” Jack gasped, wiping his mouth, tears and mucus freezing and giving his face a glassy, ethereal gleam. Pitch scoffed and held up his hand, but Jack thrust back a step, arms crossed over his panging belly. His fear flared and Pitch couldn’t control himself as he inhaled it, senses refining under the cutting terror. Jack stared into the middleground without seeing, a cold sweat pouring down his spine. Pitch’s breathing increased.

The boy’s voice was small and high, barely wringing in a sob,

“Just… gimme a sec, okay?”

The hand dropped, and this time Pitch didn’t bother insulting him. He hadn’t tasted fear so sweet.

 

* * *

 

Gradually, through no obligation other than to get Jack out as quickly as possible, Pitch began assisting him. He would stand him up, or direct his falls to the shadows where he could rest more effectively. If the sessions became too intense, Jack too weak to continue, Pitch would not comfort him, but would allot recovery time; when Jack could not see him, but know he was there.

Sometimes, Jack would joke about himself, and Pitch began smiling where it wouldn’t be seen and… misconstrued.

But when Jack’s jokes at last drew out of him a bark of laughter, he almost ended the whole thing. The next week or so, Jack wandered through the wood looking for the entrance. Pitch smoldered in the shadows of the trees and rocks, using too much energy to conceal his home. Jack tripped over it, a few days in, and wouldn’t move from that spot until Pitch let him in willingly.

Their talks returned to terse, clinical things, and Pitch hesitated or stalled his words when Jack would touch him. He wouldn’t encourage it, but he didn’t push him away, either.

 

* * *

 

Closer to the goal after several weeks, Pitch’s energy increased. He acted less like some ghost and more the bold, articulate, intentional man that Jack had known him to be. The transformation was not lost on their conversations, and Pitch’s hands became more insistent when they guided Jack helpfully to a stronger stance, or directed his quivering arms to steady themselves on a warm, robed chest. If Jack fell, his fingers would tighten, and Pitch would have faster response time.

In complete defiance of all Jack’s expectations, the pain never lessened. If anything, the extended time between sessions, Pitch’s practiced accuracy, all cost more than his body could deliver. Four sessions a visit became two, and one, and then visits had to be distanced from one another. Jack felt himself changing, whether from a successful attempt, which was his greatest hope, or Pitch’s own reconfiguration. He knew something was left askew each time, something small; insidious. He would not have known it for himself, had Pitch’s responses not changed.

They became more agreeable with one another and when, one visit, Jack still felt too weak from the last, Pitch simply allowed him to stay.

When they ran into each other in the wild, Jack would not impede his work and Pitch stopped scaring children inside, so long as Jack was there to watch their play. More kids were staying home sick, and the Guardians noticed, but they hadn’t let on that they knew of Jack’s little plot. In fact, he hadn’t spoken with any of them in months. It was the middle of winter, after all; Jack had work to do. But if the snowstorms packed less power, and came irregularly or not at all, he could base it on spending time with Jamie. Burgess was on record for snowfall in the state, three years running. Favoritism was a better excuse than fraternization.

 

* * *

 

It hadn’t occurred to Jack that Pitch might be suffering, too. The pain was usually enough to land him on the ground. His attentions didn’t extend much beyond that. But one night, after Pitch had guided him gently to the floor, he had the mind to open his eyes.

Pitch’s lips were thin, eyes narrowed at his hand. His fingers shook as he assessed the damage. Jack summoned the strength to rise to his elbows, and Pitch’s glare swung over to his spot on the ground. With anyone else, his hurried composure might be endearing, but with his arrogance it was only unnerving. Until, of course, Jack thought to glance at the hand he was trying to hide.

Black. Swollen. Frozen into place.

Pitch had frostbite.

“Pitch?” Jack questioned, panic granting enough energy for him to rise shakily to his knees. Pitch looked as though he’d been tagged for a murder. The hand was swept into the shadows, his face twitching into a half-hearted sneer.

“Ready for another?”

Jack wasn’t receptive to snubs. He stood with a waver, part of him knowing that Pitch would help steady him. Since when had he expected it?

“Don’t ignore me,” His throat felt too dry; too weak. “Has this been happening since the beginning?”

Pitch scoffed,

“Of course not.”

He wouldn’t have kept on, if it had.

Jack took a step forward, failing halfway through and leaning heavily into a nearby shadow. Pitch’s arm jerked, as though he wanted to help Jack, himself. If the shadows were a part of him, it didn’t make much sense but to be honest, Jack much preferred the feel of skin, anyway.

“Is this supposed to happen? Are both of us meant to be wrecked by the end of it?” It came out as an accusation, the fear of the place fuelling his distrust. Was his life in danger? The pain had increased tenfold since they’d begun. Had Pitch known that he would suffer, as well?

“This method is… unconventional.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?!”

Jack groped for his staff and held it close to his chest, knocking shadows off as he huddled in to stay upright.

“Are you making guesses when my life is at risk?”

“Jack,” Pitch was not good at sincerely placating, and his nerves were wearing through the pain of the wound. Jack saw pristine grey flesh slowly devouring the dead. He knew it must hurt like hell.

“What other _methods_ are there? Why choose this one?!”

Anger always took the place of his fear. Magic pouring back into him, the air grew dry and static. He couldn’t summon lightning below the earth, but he could make touching absurdly unpleasant.

“ **Jack**.” Pitch’s voice caught his attention. He angled the staff on instinct and found both of Pitch’s hands in the air, the shadows cowed at his sides. Supplicant to his will. When had the Boogeyman ever subdued himself?

“This was the only way it could work between us.”

“I don’t believe you. I could have asked Manny,”

Pitch scoffed again, arms crossing. He hid the injured one in his sleeve.

“Manny could help! If _I_ asked him, he wou—”

“ **No, he wouldn’t**.”

The pressure of the room increased. The darkness thickened and Pitch was too serious to be lying. Jack wanted an explanation for this farce, but suddenly felt he wouldn’t begin to understand it. It was infuriating and he was too much of a child to surrender.

“Then let’s try something else,”

The answer died on Pitch’s lips. His expression strained under the weight of his anger, of Jack’s anger; of the foolishness of their fight. He looked tired.

“It’s not that easy, Jack.”

Jack smirked, posture straightening. His energy was returning and ripe to argue.

“Try me.”

Pitch’s brow twitched, then he stepped back into the shadows. Jack was about to yell _Cheater!_ when a voice blew by his ear.

“ _Try the rabbit._ ”

 

* * *

 

The Warren was a 180 from the caves. Gaudy flowers and young moss sprawled over every surface. Easter was only a few months away and Jack was fresh from his fight with Pitch. Bunny could practically smell the nervous energy before he entered.

“What do you want?” He grunted, weeding his garden during a break from painting. Jack hovered alongside him, turning in the air and doing tricks for the googies. He got his full attention when a lily was sacrificed for an aerial flip.

“Out with it, Jack, I’m busy!”

He hadn’t anticipated the glow. Jack was buzzing with an electric air, nose and cheeks pink from excitement. He could have sprinted there from the Arctic.

“I have a question,”

“No, really.”

“Remember when you said only the living can have kids?”

Bunny didn’t like where this was going. An ear stood a little straighter in response.

“Okay, so say I got a living partner, then how could we do it?”

If phrasing could be the death of him, this would be it. Jack may have been over three hundred, at that point, but he still looked like a child. Not only that, but he was a colleague. A very annoying colleague.

“It’s an exchange. Of energies. They’d…You’d have to find a way to transfer from one to another.”

Carrots were very interesting.

“So, like what, walking through each other?” Jack asked carefully.

“It would look like that, yeah.”

“… Does it hurt?” His small voice made Bunny turn to him. After careful consideration, the scent finally came to him. Bunny’s eyes widened and he rose up from the garden,

“Jack, that’s not—”

“Please,” the boy begged, “I’ll get outta your hair, fur, whatever, just **tell** me. What other than that?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Well Jack, when a buck and a doe are overcome with the seasonal vapors..."


	3. Fool's Errand

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fap material.

The wind was calming. Antarctic gusts whipped his mind and body until he felt clean, strong. Pitch had known, and obviously didn’t want anything to do with him past the point of pain. The explanation Bunny proffered described a more carnal nature than Jack had been prepared for. They were spirits. He hadn’t had lust since he was human. Would it even work? Enough mornings blundering into Jamie’s unlocked bedroom had taught him of male desire. He was loathe to revive blocked memories, but he didn’t have much else to work with. He’d only had three years as a human filled with any sort of yearning, and then three hundred of isolation. It was easy to forget. Perhaps Pitch had more knowledge, but what would he do with it?

What could they do about it?

He landed in the crevasse, funneled down a frozen gulley with a wall of snow. There, hidden behind pillars of ice, was an entrance to the caverns. That he could even see it meant that Pitch wanted to talk. Jack entered on impulse, not wanting to consider the implications.

What if it all worked out?

How many times would they have to do it?

“ _Normally when one wanders back from another man’s house, one has a little shame_.”

Jack was used to speaking to darkness.

“I need to talk to you.”

Pitch materialized from the shadow of a cage. He loomed too close and carried his hands folded together. Both were pale and unblemished.

“I take it you’re ready to end this fool’s errand?”

“Not exactly.”

Silence was a better answer than he’d been waiting for. Pitch judged him stoically, then turned and advanced toward a gaping corridor. A tendril of shadow lifted the hem of Jack’s hoodie and gave a little tug. He followed in earnest, keeping to the center of the hall to avoid being grabbed at by the figures dancing through the arches of the walls. They seemed to be interested in him. He wondered for a second if they had personalities like the mares, when he saw Pitch was staring at him from an open door. The healed hand gestured that he enter.

There were no rays of light to orient him in the void. A small flame sprouted ahead of him and he kept away in fear of the heat. He thought he saw Pitch smile.

The flame grew into a fireplace, revealing dark furniture and draped walls. Eerie luxury would be a perfect theme for the Nightmare King’s own bachelor pad. Jack spied something that looked like a bar and snickered to himself, then remembered he wasn’t alone. What a thought.

“Does the rabbit know the extent of what you’re trying to do?”

“He doesn’t know about you.”

Pitch hummed and sat back in a hulking black chair. The picture of comfort, he looked like a black cat curled up on a pillow. Jack struggled yet again to keep his laughter to himself.

“I thought you’d be… I dunno. Angry.”

Pitch’s brow raised,

“Angry?”

“You don’t like other people. This is about as… ‘with’ other people as you can get,” Jack’s ears slowly flushed and fed color into his cheeks. In a few words, he was red down to his toes.

“Um,” he started, fidgeting with the staff, “you wanna talk? I don’t have much else,”

“I’m sure you do. A few years ago, we were at each other’s throats, and now you’re propositioning me in my own home. I might simply be in shock.”

“Propo…” Jack’s arms were tight at his sides, “Ah, heh, that’s… a weird way of putting it.”

Jack’s charm and smiles usually had him as the trustworthy boy next-door, but Pitch didn’t relax at all. For all his own smirks, the man was undoubtedly tense, like he just wanted the other spirit out.

“I… I don’t really know what to say. Most of what Bunny said didn’t really click, but…” Jack’s struggle earned no fanfare. Pitch’s eyes glimmered with energy but he didn’t move, didn’t even breathe. If it weren’t for the twisting shadows at the edges of his robe, Jack would have thought him a photograph.

“Geez, help me out here,”

“I only want you to state your intentions. It’s the least you can do for what’s about to happen.”

“About to… oh.” Jack’s heartbeat jumped and stuttered. He didn’t even like Pitch, but the idea of succeeding was too much to handle. He couldn’t bear looking at him, eyes searching the floor for any little distraction.

A tendril of shadow like bony fingers gently touched his chin, directing his gaze back toward the chair. The man was calculating as always, but Jack finally understood the tension. He flushed darker at the predatory glare, at Pitch’s small, cruel smile; the way his body had curled as if waiting to jump.

“Uh,” he squeaked, fingers digging into the wood of the staff, “Would you… come to bed… with me?” A gulp of air and Pitch was in front of him, towering over his head and looking down. Real fingers took up his hand, clasping two over it. Jack sighed haltingly through a wincing smile, revolted by his own nerves.

“You are _too charming_.”

The hands touching him slowly started pulling, and the room vaulted around them. The fire disappeared, replaced by faint starlight. Pitch’s eyes glowed above and Jack was falling beneath. He could only make out the black lines of the body crouched over him before something soft hit his back and his arms were splayed across pillows. They were in a bed. Pitch was taking him to bed.

He was going to have sex with Pitch.

“Um,” he mumbled as roving hands drifted under his hoodie, yanking for him to sit up. Pitch’s breath was fast in his ear, then the air cooled as he was pushed back down. Every touch seared his skin red, nightmare sand trailing the welts like black burns. Jack had never had someone on top of him. He felt like he should be melting, that the fear should provoke him to leave, but he was embarrassingly thrilled to be touched. Maybe Pitch was in similar straits.

“I’ve never done this before,” he tried, eager to break the silence; the sounds of breaths and fabric and skin sliding too much for him to process. Pitch leaned in until Jack could feel lips on his ear, pulling forth a shudder,

“ _I never would have guessed_.”

When Jack only tensed and made to hide himself, Pitch collected his wrists and gave him a view of his naked torso, wiry and taut. Jack trembled from anxiety and something that must have been pleasure.

“Don’t worry, Jack,” a hand meandered down Jack’s jawline, and his own free one clasped at that wrist to ground the rest of him. Pitch’s smile was burning him.

“It’s alright. It’s been thousands of years. You don’t need to be afraid; we’re the same.”

His features were blurring into something strange. It struck Jack that this might not be as he had observed in humans. Shadows writhed in his face and redefined the structure, sharpening bones into blades and flesh an invisible black. Jack was trying to keep down his little winces and shortened breath, but the shadows were _always_ moving, and they were very much a part of Pitch. A knee shoved remorselessly between his thighs, tendrils or hands or whatever parts of Pitch they were dragging down the naked skin of his sides.

He shivered under the assault, meeting what he was sure is called “passion” with something of his own fumbling brand. Pitch’s excitement had an unfamiliar goal, but his touches were fast and expressions animated as always. Wonder and reverence, things Jack never would have thought he’d see on Pitch Black, were there because of him. The idea of their skills being near par was oddly comforting, even if Pitch’s nails were a bit rough, and Jack wasn’t sure what he should do with his legs.

But he had an idea.

Growling above him, Pitch’s teeth flashed as Jack’s knees bumped over his thighs. Bunny had told him that much. It couldn’t be that difficult, and certainly not as painful as the other method.

Small squeaks and grunts were Jack’s contribution to the echoes in the room, though he stifled each one with admirable effort. Every noise he made had Pitch stirring above, battling clumsily with the tie on his leggings, shrugging off his own black slacks and boots. Jack was pale and beautiful, fearful and unsure in his movements. They looked very much the virgin tribute and angry god. Every red line wreaked on his skin was lapped up by the shadows. He had to huddle into Pitch’s chest for the other spirit to recognize his discomfort. Another growl was the only response as he was shoved back down, finding the shadows gone. His blood ran freely onto the sheets, Pitch’s fingers smudging the fine slits.

“ _Thiss hurtss in its own way_ …” Pitch’s voice was a deep hiss and had Jack shivering. He had to lighten the mood.

“ _Psh_ ,” he huffed, “bring it on.”

His thighs were shoved down painfully, talons edging closer to the crevice between his legs. A hand massaged him hard, tugging out embarrassed moans as he trembled under the weight of his own limbs. One finger pushed against the perineum, the others continuing to press and soothe. He jerked at the intrusion, mouth open and panting. Pitch was biting his knee and his head fell back into the sheets. He tried to ground himself with the vision of the stars above them.

The stars were golden and twinkling above them.

It wasn’t the night sky.

It was Nightmares.

Hundreds of Nightmares watching, blinking down at them.

Jack cried out and scrambled to hide his shame but another hand held him down, the living ceiling hidden by Pitch’s own sharp golden eyes, narrowing at his attempt to escape. Another finger forced its way in and the pain was sobering. Bunny had warned him, had begged that he at least find a kind partner. Too late, now.

If there was any affection to this, it was lost in translation. Pitch’s desperate, searching movements were antithetical to Jack’s blushing innocence. Sweaty arms shoved him onto his neck and shoulders, his bottom balanced in a slim grey lap. The fingers left and returned with something fiery, something wet.

“ **AH**!” He choked, back hunched in pain. He pushed at Pitch as the spirit bore into him, legs shuddering as his entrance was forced open wider and harder. The heat was killing him. He dug his nails into the flesh above him, broken pleas falling from his lips. Pitch moved back to gather his hands in a vice and the Nightmares came back into view. Jack groaned mournfully and jolted as Pitch ground in further, shaking as their pelvises finally touched.

He kept his eyes screwed tight to avoid the Nightmares, but Pitch’s breaths were a force of their own.

“ _Jack_ ,” came the panting voice. A black head burrowed into his shoulder, free hand roaming his body ecstatically. More words spilled out the Jack didn’t understand, that sent a quiver up his spine and the shadows into a frenzy.

His name in such a plea flushed his face once more and Jack clenched his teeth against the pain. The heat was stifling but his skin tingled in its wake. Pitch started to draw out and his lungs refilled in the gap before he was slowly impaled again.

“It really… _hurts_ …” he begged for Pitch to understand, to stop, but the other spirit only thrust slowly, each searing slide tugging and prodding at his organs. The movements sped up, as did Jack’s pained grunts. The Nightmares began swirling and circling above, excited by their coupling. Minutes dragged on into hours, until the feel of flesh was almost revolting.

“ _Jack,”_ another incomprehensible stream. Jack couldn’t tell which sense was picking up on them. It all seemed to blend together under weight of the pain.

Claws raked down his back and his breaths were uneven. He was scared, he was hurt. He was afraid of doing this again. In a flash of grey, fingers were pulling at his chin and Pitch gazed down at him, eyes alight and the only truly visible part of him.

“ _We can… sstop… if it’ss too much…_ ”

The reprieve was enough for him to catch his breath, Pitch freeing his bruised wrists. He almost brought them to his chest, but being tense only made it hurt worse. Pitch was buried deep inside and panting like a maniac. He slowly brought each hand to a grey shoulder, studying the shock on the other man’s face as he kept him at a more comfortable distance. Pitch handled touch just about as badly as he did.

“Just…” he tried, voice husky from crying out, “can you be _gentle?_ ”

Pitch stirred again, pushing Jack back down as he resumed. The thrusts were shallower, calculated. Desperation was culled into want, and Pitch angled and searched his walls. It felt less like a violation and more like intimacy. Jack’s fingers clenched and unclenched, Pitch following his cues to go faster or slower, depending on the pain. Without knowing, Jack pulled his head down to his shoulder, burrowing into the spiky hair and finding it soft and damp with sex. His voice was hot and cloying,

“ _Mm_ , can you… make them go away?” he breathed, arms folding around Pitch, garnering a pleasured shiver. The Nightmares sank into the darkness, and it was just the two of them again. Jack’s unease steadily dissipated, legs relaxing into Pitch’s slow thrusts.

“ _Oh,_ ” he moaned, fingers tightening their hold in black hair. Pitch mouthed at his collar bone, hips jerking at the sound, and then Jack felt all too hot.

Talons scraped for a hold on his ribs, yanking him down further on the cock pulsing inside. He whined as he was moved, writhing at the strange, full feeling inside. It weakened and stopped, until Pitch was still, folded around him, and something wet began seeping between their sexes.

Their breaths calmed and Jack relished the feel of holding someone. He’d only ever had the chance with Jamie and Sophie, and never a mate.

He and Pitch had mated.

Or so Bunny had put it.

Pitch groaned and sluggishly moved from under his fingers. He frowned at the loss. It wasn’t nearly as odd as the feeling inside, of wet cock slipping out of him. He caught the yelp before it escaped, but his expression must have been entertaining. Pitch was smiling like he’d never seen. He was practically glowing, and wound tightly around every part of Jack he could find.

It was warm. The touch was overwhelming after centuries of solitude. It made him self-conscious. Pitch only smirked at his embarrassment.

“You can stay if you like, but I’m going to sleep.”

With the way the spirit was slumped along his body, Jack would have found it difficult to flinch. He readily accepted defeat and allowed sleep to take over.

Nightmares seeped in through the cracks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was short because the flow was better if I lobbed off the rest into the next chapter.


	4. Cravings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The magic starts to kick in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> EDIT: Fixed error with chapter posting twice.

_He can’t face the Guardians. The magic needed to transport him beyond the wards of Santoff Claussen had left him somewhere in the forest. A dreary grey bed curtain greets him as he turns painfully to his side. The armchair sits empty in the desolate gloom. Fabric drags at his arm, body too weak to lift it higher than the pillow next to him._

_The sheets are cold, and Pitch isn’t anywhere near._

 

* * *

 

Without the same sort of school texts Jamie was allotted, Jack had no guide for the process. Bunny was out of the question at this point, though he had alluded to the coming stage. Pitch was teasing, but sensed it long before Jack knew quite what had changed. He’d thought it had only been the absence of the wind and ice. The lethargy that followed was perplexing as it was pleasurable.

“This is the most dangerous step,” Pitch murmured, glare a little too heated from where he stood in the shadows. Jack was bathing himself in one of the cavern’s tiny streams, a single ray of light from above illuminating the pink coloring his skin. His cheeks were round and warm against the freezing water and he ached for snow to soothe it. Yet even with his staff, he could not summon the energy. All that came to him was a light buzzing feeling. Each turn left him lethargic, but tense. Any activity like chasing the mares or swimming left him breathless far too quickly.

The feel of flesh had become an especially strange craving, one Pitch indulged regularly. Jack couldn’t make sense of it.

He smoothed out his hair and winced at how sensitive his scalp was getting, at the tingling ache in his arms whenever he moved strenuously. The white locks stunned him as they fell into his eyes. His hair hadn’t grown in three hundred years.

“I think I need to go up top, for a while. I don’t even know how long I’ve been down here.”

“You can’t leave.”

Jack started at the declaration, blinking through rivulets of cave water as he assessed his mate. Pitch looked stern but agitated. He was always on the edge of his seat, these days. Jack could hardly get an hour to himself. He laughed and shrugged out a shoulder knot,

“That’s sweet, really, but I’m gettin’ some kind of fever. I need fresh air.”

Pitch stalking _straight_ _out_ of the shadows was not a common sight, so Jack was not entirely prepared for the black pillar suddenly looming over him.

“You’re in the first stage, Jack. This is what you wanted.”

All the heat that had been plaguing him suddenly flared in his chest. His voice was still too raspy, excitement flooding his veins.

“Do you mean it’s, I’m pr—”

“No,” Pitch held up a hand and drifted closer, fingers hovering over the heated splotches on Jack’s tender flesh. The boy had been especially sensitive, of late. It was delightfully indecent.

“We’re not human, but the process is similar. You’re receptive, for now. Your body is finally preparing for conception.”

“Conce…” Jack’s mind blanked as he thought over the night they’d spent together. Pitch had been touching him at every chance since, but Jack had been restrained. Something sparked when he was touched, these days. It was maddening and delicious and he wanted to hide himself each time a hand ruffled his hair, or long fingers closed over his shoulder. Even having Pitch this close was starting to affect him.

“You’re too weak to care for yourself. All of your magic is diffusing to attract a mate. It’s quite obvious.”

Now that Jack bothered to look, Pitch was a little disheveled, himself. His breaths were shorter than normal and his eyes shined with something that made Jack stumble, leaving the river. He was suddenly very aware of how heavy gravity truly is, and how freezing the air was against his reddened flesh. Not a normal feeling for a winter wisp.

“I need to at least check in on the kids. It’s been weeks. This is my season, if I’m not there, they might,” Jack’s desperation about belief was shushed with ghostly hands.

“ _Oh_ ,” he sucked in a breath and watched, mesmerized, as Pitch’s grey fingers drew down his white chest. Blood that had always been frozen rushed to meet the skin, flushing him a wanton rouge. He would have felt scandalous, if he could feel beyond the heat.

“Jack,” Pitch hoarsely started as he drew painfully away, trying to keep on track. “Anyone capable of magic is going to respond to you. If you run into someone up there, I can’t help you. The longer this goes on, the more vulnerable and… clear your state will be.”

“The longer it… there’s more?” Jack panted, scraping his neck with trembling fingers. Even that much contact felt too good and he hid the scratch marks in shame. Pitch calmly touched Jack’s chin, turning his face to meet golden eyes. Jack was suddenly smashed into a wall of things he didn’t want to confront. Pitch was concerned, possessive. Would he be trapped down here? Something in him blossomed at the feeling. Perhaps he wouldn’t mind.

“There are many spirits who take this as open invitation. Some don’t _choose_ a mate, Jack.”

Jack’s eyes widened, but he laughed and sidled by, regaining as much composure as he could. Somehow, it kept sliding through his fingers.

“Look, Jamie’s house is only a mile away. How many spirits are there in Burgess? I’ll pop in, say _hi_ , and come right back here. _Promise_.” Jack crossed his heart and kept his breaths under careful check; his eyes were not bright with mischief alone. It occurred to him that Pitch could imprison him, but he threw that idea out for the warmth that surged through him at the image.

Pitch regarded him with a tight frown, clearly considering the method. But he huffed a short breath and tersely relented,

“An hour. One stop. Keep within Burgess and don’t touch any dream sand. If the cream puff found you, I’d slit my wrists.”

Jack slipped past the hands begging him to stay,

“In and out. Real quick. Promise.”

He flinched as shadows crawled up his calves, willing him to the surface. Comforting pressure closed around him and he missed Pitch’s expression as he ascended to the forest.

 

* * *

 

The air was warm for winter. Jack bit his lip and tried to keep quiet as he trudged through the wood. Playing hide-and-seek was one of his specialties, but so was cheating by whipping up a snowstorm. December, already, and not a snow day all month. Shame began creeping into his heart in earnest and his staff tilted morosely. What could happen to the children’s faith in him? What damage had already been wrought?

A weak breeze tickled his cheek, and the wood groaned with the roar of a gust. The wind flung him into the sky and shot over every inch of flesh, ripping his hoodie and nearly tearing the staff from his grip. His shrieking laughter seemed to placate it, but it still blew him halfway to hell, trying to assess any damage. With a satisfied whoop, it set him down in an eddy, letting him twirl from dizziness, ruffling his crazed, lengthening hair. Jamie’s house was just down the hill. Jack’s smile was tremendous as he slid down, the wind granting him enough glide where ice wouldn’t come.

If it were truly this late in the season, he’d been gone for a month. Jamie must have been worried.

The wind lifted him again, bringing him to a crouch at Jamie’s sill. The lights were on, but no one answered his tap. He climbed in anyway, tumbling into the room and sending his staff clattering to the floor. Had he lost all grace?

The room was a little different since he’d been there, the year before. Books lined the shelves where action figures had once ruled, and the space quilt Jamie had favored for sleepovers was patched and lying on a chair, not the bed. Jamie should have been fifteen; a young man, Jack reasoned, when a sudden wave of lethargy nearly forced him to his knees.

It was much stronger than before. An electric buzz thundered through his fingertips and down to his toes. He just made it onto the bed when he collapsed with a whining moan. He dropped to his knees and twisted in the comforter. The room grew quieter and he realized the shower must have been on in the bathroom. Jamie would walk in any minute.

He scrambled as much as he could to lean against the headboard, fake normality, but even the strength to rise on his arms left him in waves. The door creaked open and he flopped down into the covers, burrowing with a shiver in the warm fabric.

“Jack?”

Jamie entered wearing only a towel, his face screwed into a confused smile.

“Why are you hiding in my bed?”

Jack timed the rhythm of his speech with the shivers that racked his body.

“Oh, you know. Prime real estate for hiding from monsters. Pretty sure I saw a gremlin dart into the closet.”

Jamie laughed and walked over to his dresser, searching for some underwear. Jack’s mouth went dry. He wished he were naked, too. The thought didn’t register as wrong, his lust was so powerful.

“Haven’t gotten any snow days, lately. We were starting to think you’d retired, or something.”

Jack winced at the warning ache in his back. Stretching would feel _so_ good. To have himself on display, to lure someone behind him. His hips tensed, readying for a mate. He might die if he didn’t spread himself open. Sneaking a catlike yawn at the boy’s turned back, he stretched out on the sheets, revealing his torn clothes. Jamie turned with another question on his lips, but panicked when he saw the state of his friend.

“What happened?!” He pleaded, forgetting pajamas and running to the bed. Jack blinked and looked down, a slow blush tingling on his face. His chest was exposed from the wind-torn fabric, skin blotched with sensitive pink swaths. Jamie made to touch him but he flinched away, caught in the midst of a pleasurable buzz.

“I’m _o_ -okay,” he gasped in humiliation, faking a smile and hoping Jamie would leave him be. The boy’s widened eyes told him different. He tried to summon an explanation, but his breaths deepened at the water running down Jamie’s chest. His touch would feel _so_ good. He was glad for his weakness, else he would have pulled the other boy on top of him.

“Jack… what’s wrong with you?”

Unable to respond through his shuddering breaths, he sent a pleading look upwards. He needed to get away before he did something unforgiveable. At his silence, Jamie grabbed the floor length mirror and faced the bed with it. Jack stopped breathing, realizing only then that he had been lightly panting.

His hair was mussed as if he’d just rolled in the hay, cheeks flaring and hot. His eyes drooped no matter how alarmed he became, pupils blown and shining. The ripped sweater fell off his shoulder to reveal tensed muscles. Lips parted, wet with his breaths and flushed a rosy red, he was the single most indecent thing in all the cosmos. And Jamie had been the one to point it out to him. No wonder Pitch had been freaked. He would have jumped himself, if he’d had the chance. Jamie seemed less sure of his state, wrapping a hand over his forehead to check for fever.

Jack moaned too loudly to brush off.

“Uh,” Jamie managed, pink hastily spreading alongside the worry lining his face. Jack tried to get into a sitting position but barely came to his elbows. It had never been this bad. Was he supposed to degrade so quickly? Fear for his safety was there, but slowly dying. All he could think about was the heat. Along with several other inappropriate things. Jamie shouldn’t have fit anywhere into that context, but he was naked and muscled and very much a young man. Shame filled every crack that wasn’t pulsing with want, leaving Jack barely able to restrain himself.

If he angled his thrashing just right, Jamie would have to crawl on the bed and tend to him.

Maybe even climb on top, if he continued to resist.

He gulped,

“I’m _feeling a li…_ a little _sick._ ” Every other word was barely rasped out, his head spinning from concentration. Jamie helped him to his feet and he had to bite his lip nearly to breaking to swallow the groan. Limping toward the window, he let the wind rush past his face. Jamie sat uncertain and not a little scared in the background.

“ _Don’t worry…_ I’ll be _ba…_ back soon. ‘Kay?”

Jamie’s look begged him not to go, but Jack had to get back to the caverns at all costs. Something wasn’t right. The wind had to move him out the window, else he would have tumbled in a heap. It yanked him from the sill before he could end his goodbye and then he was being dragged through the sky. It must have sensed something was wrong. He tried to keep his panting breaths down and focus on the night, hoping for any brief distraction from his humiliation. Streams of dream sand wafted over the town, all too far away to notice him. The wind picked up an uncommon urgency, tearing him through the trees. The closer the entrance to the caves came, the stronger Jack felt, and soon he could hold his own against the gusts. He regained most control by the time he slipped through the maw, the wind giving a last playful tug at his hair before shadows clawed mercilessly over him.

Then he was in a bedroom. The flip in gravity turned his stomach and he writhed as his body readjusted.

The bed creaked and he was staring at Pitch, the other spirit’s eyes roving over him with as much suspicion as they could muster. But that was hard to translate through the lust. Jack couldn’t have been gone more than an hour and Pitch looked like a man starved. Hell, he’d felt the same.

Hands clasped over his torso, roaming down to his hips, up to his face. He enjoyed being touched more than most people, but everyone seemed to be in on it, lately. The one attempted shrug at Pitch’s advances landed him flat on his back with a mouth on his neck, so he guessed even an hour was too long.

“No one saw you?”

Jack struggled to no avail, ignoring the tremble in his voice as Pitch’s hands combed him for evidence.

“ _No_ … real quick. In and out. Just like I _sai…_ said.”

Pitch grinned at his panting words, lobbing off the shadows of his robes when he came to strip Jack of his hoodie. The switch from horny to horrified left the boy reeling.

“ _Who was it?!_ Was it Sanderson, what did he _do_ , _Jack_ , **what happened**?!” Pitch’s sentences collapsed into breathy run-ons, jagged teeth locked into a fearsome grimace. Jack whined under the claws digging into his sides and Pitch relented a little, worry sidling in beside rage. He was a complex creature.

“ _No… one_. The wind. It was _ha_ … happy to see me.”

Pitch bit his neck and shadows clawed at Jack’s hoodie, pale limbs squirming under the writhing black mass. He bunched the fabric at Jack’s waist, thumbs hooking over doeskin breeches as he ground into a trembling thigh. Jack’s thoughts slowed at the onslaught, surrendering each patch of flesh with a shiver of want. Pitch’s tongue was hot enough to melt him and left glimmering trails on his sweating skin. Once his lower half was bare, there was little preamble. That long, hot tongue dived between his legs, easing around and into his entrance while his hips stuttered and he choked on an embarrassing little _squeak_. A long finger slithered into him, movements quickly becoming jerking jabs as Pitch’s ardor grew. Teeth captured the soft, reddened flesh of his thigh, peppering it with new bruises.

He gripped the hoodie with shaking fingers, shadows coiling lightly around his wrists. He whined as they pulled away, revealing more of him while Pitch remained shrouded in darkness. His skin was alabaster against a black canvas, a Fae masterpiece with pink cheeks and heaving breaths. The hoodie was peeled off by eager shadows as Pitch worked him harder, fingers shoving deep into him and just barely grazing his prostate. He gave wanting little bucks, mouth opening and closing around breathy pleas as Pitch toyed with him. Pitch might not have liked that phrasing; might have said that it was _Jack_ toying with _him_. Jack couldn’t care less. He could hardly think, and certainly couldn’t tell the difference between his own scattered thoughts and the hoarse begging that fell from his lips. Pitch gave in quick.

The tongue left him and he shuddered at the cold, hips pressing up to seek the endless warmth grinding against him. A firm hand pushed him steadily back down, the black of Pitch’s trousers finally unravelling as Jack opened himself up, spreading his legs wider than necessary to present himself.

Thank the Moon he’d made it home in time.

Unbidden thoughts of spreading himself on Jamie’s bed, fantasies of having the boy between his legs bobbed in the shallows of his sluggish thoughts. There was little he could conceive of but pleasure, and made no distinction between its sources. Pitch pressed the tip of his cock against his little red hole, Jack on shaking elbows to watch as they slowly connect.

His eyes fluttered at the pressure, but the more he saw, the better he felt. One trembling hand reached down as he gnawed his lips, fingers parting the hole wider, granting Pitch better access to invade his core. Little moans began falling from his lips; desperate, pleading things as he thought of having sex all night, of having Pitch come inside him until he couldn’t think straight, couldn’t stand, and his belly hung low with the ultimate result of their coupling. Eager to receive his weight, Jack wrapped kneading fingers around Pitch’s shoulders, managing a small, broken smile around the whines as Pitch glanced at him. Gold eyes flashed over him and a low growl dripped from sharp teeth. His neck was instantly attacked, fangs gorging on his soft flesh while a throaty moan was muffled under his ear. Jack laughed, and maybe that was unacceptable, because the thrusts began in earnest and every movement had his back sliding over Pitch’s sheets.

He moaned like a whore and curled his legs possessively around grey hips, licking his lips of Pitch’s taste and panting at the feelings it provoked, the need to connect. His hands grabbed at Pitch’s head, threaded into coarse black hair as the man leaned into the contact, parting grudgingly from his assault of that slender neck. Jack’s mouth was red, lips swollen and perfect from biting and Pitch just stared at them, at the watery blue eyes gazing heatedly back. His thrusts picked up speed and Jack’s head fell to the side, fingers gripping halfheartedly at grey shoulders. Pitch growled again at the sight of his submission and Jack accepted more of him; more speed, more depth, eagerly accommodating the man’s girth as it barreled into him. The deeper and harder Pitch’s length went, the more insistently it struck against his prostate, lighting him up like a match. His hips lifted off the bed in callous little thrusts, bringing him as close as possible.

“ _Ah, shit… Ooohh…_ ”

He was far past embarrassment. Every thought pursued Pitch’s movements; how to get it faster, deeper. The chorus of breaths and slapping skin drove him closer to the edge, winding tighter around Pitch as he pleaded for his come. But the man only stared at his lips, thumb haltingly brushing the soft skin as he welcomed it inside and bathed it with his tongue, soaking up the smoky taste and moaning for more.

“ _Fuck me! Yes, ah, c-come inside. Come in me, Pitch. Pitch, Pitch, Pitch,_ ” Jack lost himself on Pitch’s name as a mantra, the thumb pressing against his lower lip as they stared at each other. Jack kept repeating his name, euphoric and with too much emotion. Pitch’s expression grew desperate as his name warped into cries and pleas, shoving himself deeper into Jack until the walls tightened around him and he choked, head falling to a pale shoulder as his orgasm shot through him. His legs burned as they tensed, shuddering at the intensity of his climax. Jack whined and followed shortly after, little cock bobbing and pulsing with the last futile thrusts of his hips.

Exhausted and thoroughly sated, Pitch kept himself buried inside, head comfortable in the crook of Jack’s neck as he breathed in the homey scent.

Jack was home.

Perhaps he should have monitored his words better, but the bliss was too much and Jack content to let him do as he pleased. His voice was shaky and hoarse from panting, but it only made it more intimate, something that had great effect on Jack.

“… Don’t leave the cave. You don’t need to go.”

Fingers wound through his hair and he relaxed even more, softening inside and allowing Jack to maneuver him into an embrace, still stroking him gently. The petite chest rose and fell slowly under him, stumbling through a breath with a weak but pleasured laugh that sent warmth coursing through his blood. Jack’s lips were by his ear and he craned his neck to give the boy access, whatever he needed,

“As long as you keep me entertained.”

It sounded like something Pitch might say, himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Straight up porn, yo.


	5. A God of Creation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack is a flying spirit. Being weighted down by anything would cramp his style.

After Jack’s debauched crawl out of Jamie’s room, he became more aware of his desire and its impact. Both he and Pitch were affected sometimes to the point of incapacity. Having sex for six hours at a time can do that to a man, even if he’s immortal. To Pitch’s credit, he had excellent stamina, but Jack had shorter recovery. Their abilities seemed to match most of the time, even if it meant five near-painful orgasms to Pitch’s modest one or two. All efforts had been put into coupling; Pitch hardly spared time enough to guide his Nightmares, allowing them for once to freelance. The freedom did their nightly quota well.

Jack’s existential fears were not out of bounds in their copulation. The Boogeyman would take what fear he could get, and rather than complain endlessly about it, as had been his previous strategy, Jack learned instead to gain pleasure from the fissions of chilling fright. They could be indistinguishable from pleasure.

Losing followers was a natural occurrence; he wasn’t there to reward belief, but he quickly understood that making a new spirit was going to be a fulltime job. The sacrifice, ultimately, would be worth it, and Jamie would always be there to keep him real and make him whole. Although, increasingly, that role of comfort was being left to Pitch. Pitch, who couldn’t provide belief, but could grant something Jack had never gotten and always wanted.

A home.

They were making a family.

Even if Pitch’s conditions for their relationship by nature limited it, Jack was starting to see that he had already become invested, even just the tiniest degree. He wouldn’t go so far as to assume the other spirit would be around to raise the imminent child, but whenever Jack lingered in front of a mirror, or rubbed his belly, demanding their work take root, he found Pitch sidling up behind him, closing elegant fingers over his own and staring at his slender form just as intently; willing it to fruition. These actions usually led to foreplay, which Jack enjoyed just as much as sex, but Pitch seemed to _crave_.

Nobody would ever have pegged Pitch to be the gentle type. And really, he wasn’t, but he delighted in the mystery and softness of tender touches, of luring Jack into pleasure even though he was being baited just as well. Each of them contributed an increasing amount of energy and where before, Jack had been reticent about sex, and Pitch perhaps too predatory for his liking, the both of them had aligned their desires. If one became aroused, it was not without the instigation of the other.

After almost a full day’s work, they lied entwined in Pitch’s recessed bed. Nightmares were no longer allowed in his room, but sand drifted freely across the floor, ebbing into shadows and swallowing any messes they’d made; righting any tipped furniture.

Jack swirled his fingers in Pitch’s hair, strands left soft and lank with days of oil and sweat. He inhaled the scent and shifted in arousal, wriggling his hips beneath the other’s collapsed form.

No dice. Pitch slept as peacefully as a man on morphine.

Flopping back some, Jack moaned pitifully. He felt disgusting and there was no way Pitch was going to wake for another few hours. If he lingered in bed too long, he might fall asleep, too, or at least grind himself against the other’s body until it was half-hard and try and get a round in, himself. It wasn’t like he’d never woken up from Pitch’s hips steadily thumping against his, the smirk watered down and teasing; gentle, rather than cruel.

Shivering at the thought, his arousal rose. Maybe he could take care of this, himself. Or better yet, get in a real bath; not just splashing around in the cave streams.

It was about four in the morning. Nature spirits were mostly asleep and the dream sand above should have finished its job for the night. More importantly, the children were nowhere near waking, and Jamie would be safe from him. The pond was only a dozen or so yards from the entrance to the cavern, and Jack felt too disgusting to resist the call to bathe. He didn’t even bother donning clothes; he hadn’t worn them in a good, long while and didn’t want to risk rubbing his filth onto them. Too many days in bed had left him rank, in his own opinion, even if Pitch was overcome with lust at the sight of his shining skin, the mussed hair. Not to mention the mess constantly leaking from between his legs.

Focus. No more sex for now. Bath time.

He tried to whistle but his breaths were irregular, these days. He could hardly hum without groaning at the wonderful vibrations in his skin; the way his voice shook the love bites on his neck.

No. Focus.

After several months’ investigation, he’d found a few ways to reach the surface without Pitch’s help. He hadn’t used them, at least not when the other was awake, because Pitch was so horribly convinced that his honor would be violated if he so much as _stepped_ on the ground, above. Jack had to grant him that; his last excursion was embarrassing enough.

But he _needed_ this bath. As he climbed through the tunnels, careful of his weak, twitching muscles, he kept thinking of how much better he’d feel clean after too long, down there. Pitch had a few short pools, but invisible things snapped at his feet. And when he’d iced them in retaliation, Pitch had gotten mad at _him_. Go figure. The way up wasn’t too pleasant, either; jagged rocks cut into his flesh and the rub of stone made his skin raw, but he kept at it. Having all this grime caked on, he felt weighted down. Too heavy for the wind to carry him and invariably _stuck_.

He was a little stir-crazy, too, but that was beside the point. He had legitimate reasons. _Good_ ones.

The first little breeze brushed his skin and he sighed, poking his head out of the hole to make sure no predators were lurking about. Were he not out of breath, he would have giggled. He must have looked an awful lot like Bunny exiting a tunnel.

Standing was harder. There were no steps to assist him and he had to drag himself across the snow because his limbs shook so badly. He hadn’t had a workout that didn’t involve some degree of lying down or being propped up in… in…

Okay, he didn’t work out, but he felt damned clumsy at the moment.

“I’ll totally join a gym after this. I’m gonna be a hot soccer mom,” he panted as he at last fell onto the welcoming ground, “Might even join a spin class.” No one would mind him lying in the snow for a few too many minutes. He was almost unsure he’d have the energy to climb down. Meh. If he fell, the shadows would catch him, and Pitch would nag him about the surface, but he wouldn’t believe Jack had actually made it up there.

Hell, Jack could hardly believe it.

Once he’d clawed up a tree trunk enough to get vertical, he began ambling toward the pond. His feet ached at such sudden use after days on his knees, but he promised them a nice ice bath and they started speeding him toward it.

First step in and shivers ricocheted through his body. As a frost spirit, cold wasn’t a deterrent, but as a wisp in heat, perhaps there were certain things he couldn’t do as normal. He waded slowly in, sinking through the soft muck at the shore and sitting on the bank. Water lapped lightly at his chest and he shoved some snow into a pillow, then leaned back with an exaggerated sigh. Baths once a week after this. Screw Pitch. He’d picked himself up and gotten to the pond without much mishap, bleeding feet content to marinate in ice water. He could take care of himself just fine.

The slow, satisfying process of wringing off all the oil and grime left him spotless and happy. Relaxing into his little pillow, which had, after an hour or so, evolved into a full chair half-submerged in the water, he let out a contented sigh and thought a nap might be in order. Daylight wasn’t for a few hours and Pitch was knocked out when he’d left. He deserved some shut-eye after all the trials of the evening.

But he hadn’t taken care of all of them.

Drumming gently in the back of his head, the arousal Pitch hadn’t been awake to quell reared up and grabbed hold. He turned his cheek onto the ice, hoping the cold would stifle it some, but moving felt too wonderful to bear. Silt kicked up around his legs as he itched them together, blearily looking down to find his thighs tight and grating against one another. Kneading his lip with his teeth, he knew the best course of action was to return to the cavern. Even succumbing to lust, part of him still remembered that it was dangerous to do this in the open. Pitch had told him what could happen.

 _Could_.

Well, he’d said _would_ , as in _definitely_ , but Jack wasn’t entirely convinced.

What if he just stayed in the water? The only spirit this pond had ever harbored was him, and water would wash off any scents he emitted. It was the perfect crime for his horny thought process, and he wasted little time getting down to it.

“Just real quick—in n’ out.”

He smiled, biting his lip as he reached between his legs and parted them. The slope didn’t make it easy; the leverage he needed could only be achieved a little further up the water line, but he sank back as far as he could, just to be cautious. He wouldn’t be thinking that clearly for much longer. He should take advantage of it.

A long sigh breezed out of his chest as he touched himself, lightly stroking his length as trembling fingers prodded his loose entrance. Grinning at the ease of access, his shoulders hunched slightly as he was penetrated. Shaky, hypnotic breaths left him as he closed his eyes, grinding into his fist as his fingers wandered further inside, working out all the stuff Pitch had so graciously left him. Jack was always capable of snark—he was the master of snark, but without anyone around to entertain there was little point in mocking Pitch. Especially when he’d been begging for it in the first place.

One thing he’d give his fingers over sex was that it was easier to find his prostate. A light brush left his lips falling open, head tilting back while ankles spread further to accommodate his pleasure. Two fingers became three, and then he felt helpless because he wanted something bigger and there was nothing around that could do the job. In compensation, he jacked off harder, but that could only get him so far. It wasn’t the organ in question. He needed to be _filled_ and dammit, maybe his evil genius just hadn’t worked out this time. With the weakness of his limbs and difficulty pulling himself up, he wondered if making it down to the cavern was an option. He’d be damned if he called for the help of the Nightmares, even though Pitch had told him to make use of them, were he ever in danger.

“ _Mnngh,_ ” he managed, which was supposed to have been a curse, but he hadn’t exactly mastered motor function, at the moment.

His breathing was harsh and peppered with moans, fingers scrabbling to climb up the bank. He needed to get back quickly—the water would only hide his scent for so long. Ten, maybe fifteen yards to the caves and then he’d be home-free. Something clever died in his throat as he finally struggled fully onto land, smothering his voice as best he could in his shoulder. Part of him knew that wouldn’t be enough, but his lust was starting to cloud things. Maybe he shouldn’t care. Maybe it would be better if someone came and relieved him. The idea of being used like that should have repulsed him, he vaguely knew, but the heat between his legs was louder than reason.

A small burst of adrenaline got him up onto his knees, hands pressing hard into the ground as if the Earth would simply push him up, but he had no strength to stand. He licked his lips, groaning and the feel of his tongue soothing the worried surface. Alright. He could crawl. He wasn’t above crawling, as long as no one was around to see.

He dimly registered the shifting snow, a branch breaking behind him, but sounds were muffled beyond his rapid heartbeat. The smell hit him first, causing his elbows to wobble as he slowly turned to look behind him.

A young man with earthy skin and dark hair, draped in animal furs like an Old World king. Jack blinked sluggishly, some mute part of him driving his limbs to tense to try and escape, but the feeling only dropped another moan from his lips, and the youth watched him intently. His smile reminded Jack faintly of Pitch, who really shouldn’t be such a heavy sleeper.

“ _Hello.”_

The man’s voice was smooth and deep. Jack imagined him panting and whined, willing him to disappear. Of course it had to be a spirit. It couldn’t have been a kid or a wolf or an ax murderer; something benign. Yet he was grateful, and only dimly thinking of right and wrong. Had he reached the cavern, Pitch would have cared for him, but a stranger might do just as well. Breathing became harder, fists clenching the frozen Earth as he gasped and his shoulders slunk forward, hips cocked. By the time he realized his eyes were closed, a strong hand was gently pulling his chin up. The man was before him, the regalia over his torso sliding off into the snow. He grinned down at Jack, who blinked, all flushed cheeks and pink lips, his hair too long and falling over an eyebrow.

The man inhaled and stroked his chin. Jack mewled and bowed again, thighs itching as he rubbed them together.

“You’ve already mated, but you haven’t conceived,” his voice was liquid and teasing. It flowed into Jack like honey. “You should pick a mate with stronger seed.”

Jack fell back into the snow as the stranger pushed him, limbs too numb and weak to catch himself. A brown knee fell between his legs as the man crawled over him, one hand creeping down to remove the pelts covering his lower body. Jack mewled as a thumb traced his wet lips, readily opening his mouth to suckle at the stranger’s fingers.

“I can give you dozens of children,” the pelts fell away to reveal the largest cock Jack had seen in his life, and even though fear spiked in him, he couldn’t wait to feel it inside. The man growled in his ear, a hand stroking his flat, white belly, “I will make you heavy with my seed. You’ll never leave my den.” He bit his ear and Jack moaned loudly, gasping for air as he stared longingly at the man’s cock, already hard and coming to him. It must have been as long as his forearm, at least. He whined and shifted his hips closer, struggling beneath the stranger’s weight. A happy chuckle met his eagerness, and he felt like a child for whimpering.

The hot tip of the cock nudged at his wet entrance and Jack keened, hands quivering as they climbed the man’s arms and gripped weakly at the hard muscle there. He nearly swooned. Strong seed, indeed. Maybe this was for the best. He winced as he was breached and his head fell to the side, teeth gritting as the fat fleshy mass bore into him, stretching him wider than Pitch ever had.

Thanking of Pitch made him choke on a sob and the stranger chuckled again, keeping one hand on his chest so Jack couldn’t wriggle away.

“You’ll belong to the Coyote. You should feel very fortunate.”

For all the pain, Jack _did_ feel fortunate. Eyes wide as he felt himself tear, he still was satisfied with his choice. There was no stronger impulse than to mate other than saving someone. Saving himself should have marked higher on the list.

The man could not enter him fully. Jack was crying from pain and relief and his head spun with the effort it took not to scream. Surely, his nails were biting gashes into the stranger’s arms, but when he looked up he found his hands were barely holding on, almost draped over the luxurious dark skin. Part of him missed Pitch; the monochrome of their bodies when they slept together. The stranger thrust hard, trying to gain full access, but Jack was already full to the brim, and couldn’t help the dolorous shriek that pierced the calm night air.

Travelling through dimensions never felt _good_ , but neither did a billion grains of nightmare sand digging frantically into his skin. He was ripped from the stranger into a quickly closing portal, the furious braying of rogue Nightmares echoing in the wood behind him. After a few seconds in the silence and darkness, he realized he was crying, back shaking with the effort of breathy sobs and cheeks wet with shame and fear.

Any other day, he would have looked beautiful like this, but Pitch couldn’t swallow past his own fears to comment on it, even though he desperately wanted it known. Jack kept shaking on the floor, nothing to cover him or the fluids leaking from between his legs, blood mixing with lubrication and thank the Moon, nothing else. That seemed to cure Pitch a little. It should have been his greatest fears that were allayed at the sight, but too many raged inside of him to quell or even identify. Jack was _his_. Jack was _hurt_. Jack deserved _better_ and he hadn’t been there to help. To prevent this abomination.

Jack, himself, couldn’t speak. He could barely manage crying through his still-rising arousal, thoroughly ashamed of the way his hips squirmed and his eyes begged Pitch to come relieve it.

Pitch wasn’t sure he was capable of that. Even though he could smell the heat and Jack, lovely Jack, something in him felt attacked and wounded. His first response would be to crawl back into the darkness but instead he found himself stepping forward so that Jack could see him; bending down to lift the small, shivering body and remembering how light Jack was. How delicate his mate could be.

He could taste Jack’s questions even though the boy never spoke, and avoided teleporting because it didn’t agree with him.

His voice was gruff, weathered. It sounded too grave for a reunion,

“There are pools deeper in the cave. You may bathe there.”

The panic thrumming constantly under Jack’s skin, fear Pitch hadn’t given, did little to help his own state. He hadn’t expected much more of himself; he was well aware of his reactions to fear, to Jack’s fear in particular. A sense of inevitability penetrated him, and he knew he would have to relieve himself, relieve Jack. It made no sense to pretend it wouldn’t happen and that such an occasion would change this factor of their agreement. He was as much bound to his lust as Jack has become, and until now had been the only one conscious of its power. Whatever Jack had endured he wasn’t likely to share. They may not strictly have been enemies, but they certainly weren’t friends. Pitch had been lured into an alarming state of trust from which he now had to recover, not that he blamed Jack for any of it. Jack had no direct power over him, even if the curl of heat in his limbs screamed otherwise and begged to be released. He would remain responsible for his actions, he told himself, even if Jack could not.

For all their… relationship exhausted him, Pitch wasn’t sure he could ever sleep again. And all Jack wanted to do was faint like some damsel, but the heat inside him was overwhelming, and the humiliation surrounding it hopelessly real. Both knew they would have to satisfy their lusts soon. There was little either could do but live with it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coyote is the creation god in several Native American religions. Having fertility power badass enough to produce a universe requires a huge schlong to pack it in. There are several myths thrusting his nethers into various troubles. I would highly recommend whipping them out during story time with the kids.
> 
> And I told myself I wouldn't write another rape story. Tsk. Bad Good_Evening! Bad!


	6. Event Horizon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What fan scholars might term "feels."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> H... hello, everyone. My name is... Good Evening, and I'm an... I'm an irregular updater.

Jack had spent the greater part of three months in bed. Pitch had bathed him and slept with him whenever the heat became too much, but the banter had ceased. Conversations relied on both participants, yet the tense silence Jack blamed almost entirely on himself. Pitch tried to engage him several times before retreating to an arm chair next to the bed, waiting for his partner to twist too much in the sheets, or to cast a helpless, self-loathing glance over a white shoulder. The heat was getting worse. Lazy peace settled comfortably in the darkness after each round, Jack resting heavily against Pitch in a tired, sated cuddle, but it couldn’t last. Eventually Pitch left or Jack pulled away. As the heat strengthened and became almost painful, it managed to soothe the open wound in their partnership. There was no time to worry or think; biology was at work, and they had reduced their coupling to a reliable science.

Pitch knew why it was getting worse, but he wouldn’t say it. Even if Jack had the presence of mind to listen to him, he wasn’t sure he could summon the words without shrinking back into the shadows. His pride was well wounded without gambling his expression.

Jack’s plan was working. He was going to have their child and would be happy. He had all his immortal life to overcome this incident, and to live beyond Pitch.

But the possibility of a child with his face or Jack leaving him immediately after weren’t that which concerned Pitch. In spirits, conception and pregnancy were much the same thing. There was no single seed to be planted; no quick union. Pitch had to provide as much energy to form anything viable as Jack, himself, expended and once heat set in, it was a matter of time before it reached its long peak, and they would be forced repeatedly together for the duration. What worried Pitch wasn’t the outcome, necessarily. He’d known what he was getting into. It was that he may share those results with another being other than Jack. That whatever happened in the forest had started the process and he would have his offspring in common with another being.

He was not ashamed that he thought of causing Jack to miscarry. Possessiveness was in his nature as it is in the nature of all partnered creatures. He was not disgusted that he easily pictured himself killing the child once born, if that would be easier. He knew it wouldn’t be, but the sweet, cooing baby in his imagination didn’t have his features, and Jack still held it close. It sickened him. Such an abomination would have to die.

What was honestly getting to him was that he didn’t want to hurt Jack. Attribute that to their mating, to the instinct that drove him to protect his legacy, and he would have been scot-free of conflict. But he was repulsed as much by the thought of having a mixed child as having Jack pained by its death, and that was a problem of existential proportion. Part of him was inspired to take it out on Jack; to introduce a suitable violence to sex, making it invigorating as well as detached. If he could remind himself of his place in the world and delight properly in Jack’s fear of pain, fear of abandonment, then he could reconcile his current fascination with what he’d known himself to be. Because it was fascination. He was captivated by Jack’s tenderness, Jack’s delicious need of him, and abhorred his own blooming desire.

Jack woke into lust and could not sleep without Pitch’s company. They had sex more regularly than humans eat, but Pitch’s violence could not deter what had already started to flower. Rather, it made it starker; vivid; beautiful.

Trying to hold Jack’s hands down didn’t work. His fingers faltered sooner and sooner, until his desperately weak grip became foreplay and Jack would watch him, lust clouding his pain with a small smile. How could any creature find it so simple to smile? Jack did not wear his violation, so Pitch had taken up the mantle. If days and weeks of isolation had not seen him healed, Jack at least learned to live with his wounds, something Pitch had done many times in his life and yet could no longer comprehend. His judgment was murky around Jack. Cruelty and empathy often overlapped, and Pitch grimly recognized the projection he cast over the boy.

No one else _knew_ what it felt like. They didn’t _have_ to be alone.

They just happened to be.

 

* * *

 

After several months of speaking as little as possible to each other, Pitch was startled by a bloodcurdling scream. Normally, this sort of thing would not scare him in the slightest, but Jack put him so on edge he suspected his hair might be falling out.

Racing through the cave system and panting so hard it hurt, he reached Jack’s own homey quarters, pausing at the frost-encrusted arch as he saw his mate, standing tall and naked in front of a mirror of polished ice. The subtle curve of his belly was accentuated by the silvery surface, and the water in his eyes froze in his excitement. He turned as he saw Pitch’s reflection, hands worshipfully cradling his belly, breaths already labored with joyous tears. His smile was so confused, so awed and innocent. Pitch stopped breathing, back straightening as he surveyed the tiny bump, eyes glued to the shining skin before Jack moved, let out a delighted yelp as his grin nearly broke his jaw.

He gestured enthusiastically for Pitch to join him,

“Come feel, feel it!” He cried hoarsely, hands rubbing in captivating patterns over the pure flesh. Pitch entered the room slowly, unable to change his gaze, approaching Jack with a definite air of distrust. It seemed like an illusion. Annoyed by his hesitation, Jack reached out and grabbed a bony wrist, tugging him into a trip that sent him stumbling to remain upright. Flustered and not a little ticked, Pitch made to growl at the boy when his hand was set on the belly, riding the sure curve between rib cage and stomach, learning the fruits of their labor.

Jack cried again, too happy to put into words as Pitch held his hand firmly on the skin, prodding elsewhere with shadows, part of him feeling tricked, revolted. But there it was. It had happened.

When at last he looked up he found Jack grinning at him, blue eyes bright with tears and bliss. Pitch began to assume full height, Jack’s light grip on his shoulder drawing a pale arm up. They were nearly embracing. Jack tugged on him, half-laughing, half-hyperventilating as he jittered,

“It’s finally happened. This is it. This is it, this is it, this is it, oh _WOW_ , I can’t believe it,” he giggled ecstatically, Pitch enthralled by his beauty, his happiness. “I mean, we _gotta_ think of names now but I don’t want anything too modern and maybe, you, know, you’re not from around here so you, you, oh, _HECK_ , how are you not going _CRAZY_ right now?!” he kept laughing, belly shaking with the force of his euphoria. His cheeks were round and pink, body filled out and colored as if he were alive. Pitch held him a bit tighter, gaze drifting over the longer, soft hair, the glistening lips flushed red with pleasure. A hand came to rest on his other shoulder, bringing his attention to Jack’s eyes, the clever glint in them shining so brightly it pained him.

“Well,” the boy drawled, crossing one leg casually over the other as he leaned into Pitch’s chest, “aren’t you gonna say anything?!”

This was too much skin. Pitch’s mind wasn’t functioning properly. And no matter where he looked, how intently Jack urged him to face him, his eyes always fell back to the newly pregnant belly, sliding over its surface in disbelief. After several moments of silence, which appeared to be slowly killing his mate, Pitch finally murmured,

“ _Well done._ ”

Jack pulled back and grey hands grasped longingly at air, Pitch’s heart stopping with the force of his desire to reconnect. A slightly miffed expression met him, cheeks just a bit redder.

“Is that all you have to say?”

The question was quiet for how angry Jack looked, how readily he might have pounced or fought any other time. Pitch had the vague feeling he was straddling the border between success and failure, of Jack falling back into his daze, refusing to speak. But he couldn’t think of the words the other was longing to hear; couldn’t think of speech as being appropriate at all. He was still waiting for his feet to touch the ground, for the world to form wholly around him. Unable to articulate this, he spent one last intense glance on Jack’s belly and stalked forward, the black of his robes wrapping around them. Jack wouldn’t usually care for being smothered, but listening to Pitch’s reaction seemed to be his one motive in the universe. And because Pitch could not think, could not speak, he followed the only logic that seemed to fit.

He bent as much as he could, for as close as they were, and kissed Jack slowly on his lips.

For all they had done, nothing so tender had made it into the bedroom. His lips were chapped and the kiss was probably not very good, but his heart was about to break from how hard it was pounding, and part of him wanted to die. Jack, thankfully, could not sense his conflicts; the hard line of his mouth as he drew quickly away. But he could see through the darkness, could see what Jack perhaps wanted kept secret.

“ _Wow,_ ”

A humble whisper, and nothing more.

Jack hugged him a little tighter, pulling on his shoulders and jumping in shock when he acquiesced. Their second kiss was just bit longer but Jack broke it with a laugh, nuzzling the underside of Pitch’s jaw and embracing him fully. Without their knowledge, a shaking grey hand made its way back to Jack’s stomach, resting gently on the curve, almost for fear it would pop. Jack held him as hard as he could, the strain of the moment draining what emotions he had left. He wiped his face and continued to smile, lightly touching the corners of his mouth and wincing,

“Ouch, I haven’t smiled this much since I was a kid,” he breathed, tears relentlessly forming as he continued to wipe at them. Pitch pulled him into another embrace, tucking the fluffy white head under his pointed chin and glaring into the darkness, subdued. Little hands clenched at his robe in thanks, a sniffle echoing in the narrow cavern.

This was it.

No turning back.

 

* * *

 

Jack’s disappearance did not go unnoticed. Pitch felt the waver around the globe; lengthening summers bleaching out the winter rains and leaving the land rough and infertile. The Wind did its best to blow away the dead leaves, but without Jack to replenish the glaciers, no new rivers were born, and the old ones soon dried up. This was problematic for a certain spirit. The only spirit, it happened, that knew anything of Jack’s condition, or where he might be.

Ripples in the earth above sent pebbles cascading from the ceiling, a confused dance along the fissures trying to pluck loose the vents. Pitch’s breaths came slower until he stilled, the darkness tangible around Jack in the deepest part of the caves, keeping his rare sleep undisturbed. The Rabbit should know not to disturb a sleeping mother.

When the crack finally appeared and a furry head cautiously poked out, Pitch had spears at the ready. The Nightmares were absent, feasting on the broiling surface, but his fearlings were ready for war around him. The stark lines of his robe had become jagged and curled, black hair unkempt and frayed. He looked feral, and willing to do anything to protect his mate. The Rabbit, to his credit, did announce his intrusion, clearing his throat and tapping his great clawed paw on the ground, signaling a peaceful entrance. Pitch kept his weapons close, refusing to leave the shadows. His transformation might be… alarming.

“Well, uh… Jack? That you, mate?”

Pitch growled at the familiar term, eyes glowing through the bleak. Bunny gathered himself, shoulders hiking to find his old enemy glaring back at him. Voice hoarse, for all he’d tried to soothe it, he addressed the shadows as a whole, unsure of Pitch’s shape.

“Pitch.”

A few shadows swept fluidly past him, leaving Pitch’s side to sniff the shrinking fear around the rabbit. His revealed face was pointed and gaunt; starving, but more solid than he’d been when Jack had first found him. Real.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?”

His voice had changed, once a light hiss and now rugged, animalistic. He sounded less of a Boogeyman and more of a beast, and Bunny noted it with widening eyes. Pitch was, on his part, somewhat astonished he’d managed to speak at all. Months of nothing but moaning and grunting over Jack’s swelling form had done little to keep him looking human. Even Jack was altered, parted from Humanity for so long he seemed to have forgotten he hadn’t been born a sylph. It was most…gratifying to behold his transformation.

“I think you know why I’m here.” Bunny made to step forward, but as his foot lifted, a row of black spikes jutted soundlessly from the floor, encasing him. Pitch entered a wavering stream of light, the high collar on his throat emblazoned with dull silver glinting in the spare ray. He cocked a brow, trying to smile graciously around an awkward array of teeth, but seeming only to manage a beastly leer. The rabbit pulled back, eyeing the spikes surrounding him and hand creeping back to his boomerang, just in case. He attempted again, not surrendering to the scare tactics.

“Jack has responsibilities.”

“Which he is honoring with every breath.” Pitch countered him effortlessly. Jack’s whole purpose in the world at this moment was to have his child. The Rabbit should understand that.

“He has to come back, just for a while.”

“He is **incapacitated** , at the moment.”

Bunny frowned deeply, standing tall and proud. Part of Pitch’s mind hissed at him to attack for his insolence, for disrespecting him in his element, but the rabbit was on a roll.

“Then I need to see him.”

Were Pitch not jumping at every word with his hands on his scythe, he might have laughed. As if he would surrender Jack for even a few seconds. He’d already been broken by one intruder; he wasn’t about to trust any fertility god around his mate. Bunny stepped forward, spikes sinking through him like fog before they vanished, Pitch too riled to hold the illusions without alerting or endangering Jack. He hissed, shadows lurching like ink in water through the light streams,

“That’s far enough.”

“Let me see him.”

Pitch stood directly in front of him, the two at eye-level, he at more of a hunch, bowing to the effort to restrain his ire. The Rabbit stared him head-on, and spoke softly, placating,

“He might be in danger. He can’t be separated from the ice for too long. You know that.”

The darkness shivered, intensifying and pulling tightly around them. Pitch grimaced hatefully, remembering the constant threat of Jack’s powers against his fragile state.

“On the contrary: a Winter spirit must be kept under very specific conditions. I am seeing to his needs most expertly.”

Bunny scoffed, “Because a shade knows how to take care of children. Right. If you won’t lead me to him, I’ll find him, myself.” Pitch wondered for a moment if he were truly stupid. Every corridor could be bent into a loop, the whole cave system relying on his will to sustain its pathways. All he’d have to do was twitch and the map would change completely; devour itself. But the rabbit had his own tricks. He removed from a quiver an empty jar, and when he opened it, a breeze rushed past Pitch’s stunned face. A flash of fur. A race with no announcement.

He rounded on the other spirit, chasing him through portals and shifting the caves as the Wind penetrated deeper, howls resounding on the ancient rock as it delved closer to Jack, halls collapsing in quick succession, just clipping the last hairs on the rabbit’s tail. It was a short run. Most of Pitch’s energy was going into Jack, and the best he could do was be there with him when the enemy stormed the gates. He clenched a small, white hand as the rabbit entered, Wind rushing gratefully around Jack, just stirring his hair as it dissipated. Bunny’s shock ended quickly. He swelled with warmth and life as he neared Jack, Pitch hissing as his fur brightened, the symbols half-glowing, bathing his mate in an ethereal light.

“It’s alright,” he murmured to Pitch, not really seeing him as he played through the same things he’d told every male that became a father. And Pitch nearly clawed his eyes out to find the soothing words working, his spindly hand relaxing around cool, smooth flesh, still refusing to relinquish his weak hold. The rabbit paid him no mind.

“’Ey, Jack.” He whispered, and Jack’s lashes fluttered for a second, hand instinctively creeping tighter into Pitch’s grip.

His hair was mussed, long enough to cover his forehead and shimmering with flecks of frost. As an afterthought, Pitch made to cover his nakedness, glad at least that he had cleaned him after their last round together, but Bunny stopped him gently, and he fumed inside again at how calming the effect was; how sure he felt about Jack’s state, unaware that he’d had any fears about the boy’s health, until now. So even the Boogeyman’s skills were at the whims of his instinct.

“Jack,” Bunny whispered again, and this time dreamy eyes opened, pupils wide and black as he blinked through his sleep. Slender fingers uncurled as he stretched, squinting blearily through the haze of light around him. It took a few moments to decipher the face before him.

A small, loving smile spread on Jack’s face as he turned, recognition flaring in his eyes. His voice was hoarse with misuse and deeper than usual, sparking a pleasurable fire in Pitch’s belly. Though the white hand around his weakened its grip, he returned the carelessness with a stony vice, desperate to maintain some control of himself as Jack was subject to Bunny’s inspection. Whatever the rabbit found must have been surprising. With Jack’s enthusiastic permission, eager fingers pulling him closer, Bunny set his paw on the round, alabaster stomach, marveling at the gentle curve; the sloping crescent of the waxing moon. Claws carefully tucked in, he felt around the stomach, grin shining on his face as he spoke with Jack of the growing spirit’s health, how he needed to leave the cave for a while.

Jack’s smile faltered, eyes flashing with heat and fear as Bunny let go and waited patiently for the boy to agree with him.

“ _I mean_ ,” Jack rasped, “I would love to. But no one else can know.” His voice lowered cautiously, but his hand remained confidently limp in Pitch’s fingers, only squeezing once to reassure him when the taloned grey clutch became painful.

“I’ll go with you, myself.”

“ _You will **not**_ ,” Pitch hissed hatefully, shadows writhing about his feet as his stance grew offensive. Jack shushed him and patted his hand, smiling warmly at his overbearing concern.

“I think that’ll work.”

Immediately, Pitch sprung into a tizzy, arguing in a vicious growl with Jack, threatening him with a repeat of what had happened, something Bunny couldn’t yet know. The room chilled with their fight, Jack slowly clenching the blankets swirled around him as he returned Pitch’s animosity with increasing wit and humor. Their hands never separated, even though Pitch’s claws extended and retracted with the volume of his voice, each of which he kept in careful check, purposely quieting after each shrill exclamation. Jack only delighted in their game, pausing every now and then to glance at Bunny with so much mirth in his eyes he looked to be choking on the unreleased laughter. And Bunny, having known every couple that had ever reproduced, at least to a slight degree, smiled back.

Pitch was weak, likely weaker than Jack, and still heavily encouraged not to stray above the surface. He hadn’t flexed his muscles in almost a decade, and even a spirit can atrophy if left forgotten, long enough.

“How long will it take?”

Bunny jumped when he realized Jack had addressed him. Pitch glared at him with admirable ferocity, willing his silence while he calmly smiled back,

“That depends on you. Maybe a day. Maybe several,”

“ _Absolutely not._ ” Jack turned to Pitch with a raised brow, then started to gather himself. The alarm that flourished in the Boogeyman’s expression was, if Bunny was honest, hilarious. He scrambled to lure Jack back into bed, a multitude of tiny shadow hands tugging on the boy’s elbows, the fluffy tips of his hair. Clearly unaccustomed to his new weight and balance, Jack struggled for a moment to calibrate, shrugging off the dozens of searching hands. His knees wobbled, forcing him to lean on Pitch’s shoulder as the other went stiff to support him. It was odd to see the spirit of fear so helpful, so earnest. Bunny couldn’t gauge this new Pitch.

With a triumphant whoot, Jack took his first honest steps in several weeks, leering at Pitch with a sickening grin,

_See? Toldja I could do it._

Jack managed a few weak strides before gratefully hugging Bunny’s arm. Pitch dissolved into nothing but teeth and shadow, jerking him back into a powerful, though oddly reverent hold. A little bewildered by their comedy, Bunny started the trek out, quickly remembering that the only reason he’d been able to get this far had been with the assistance of the jar of wind. As he glanced over his shoulder to see if one of them would lead him, he caught the two men in a tender moment.

Pressed tightly against Pitch’s body, Jack’s hand had risen to the other’s face, holding it gently and soothing the worried brow. Pitch’s dark fingers crept out of the black to quietly touch the round white belly tucked beside him. Their lips connected in a chaste kiss, Jack whispering something incomprehensible with a soft smile. Pitch’s frown deepened, but his brow relaxed; shoulders collapsed in resignation as he pulled Jack closer. Bunny was only mesmerized for a few seconds, but it was more than enough to burn the image into his mind forever. To see a friend with none other than Pitch Black turned his stomach, reminded him of hatred he’d never quite conquered. But swallowing his pride, he allowed them to finish, and was glad when Jack finally made to guide him out, cheeks full and pink with the life of his young. It pacified the rage in him, the concept of new life.

Keeping nervously to the shadows around them, Pitch approached the hole in the Earth and spied out between stalactites. His eyes narrowed into silver slits at the calm world above. Jack needed help ascending, but before he could offer, Bunny had already taken him up in his arms, and had begun bounding up the cave walls to the surface. Jack squealed with laughter, and Pitch watched the way his eyes glittered, heart thumping out of time, jealousy fumbling with his pulse as small white hands gripped desperately the ragged fur surrounding them.

He neared the surface as much as he could, moonlight shredding the shadows supporting him. With one last shrill wail, Jack had left the cavern, and Pitch could hear only the echoes of his laughter.


	7. What Goes Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack takes a snow bath. Everyone questions his ability to parent. Jamie is... a bit of a brat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This has been extended! And may have a sequel. Maybe. Perhaps. In theory.

_Jack’s energy increases as he rests even in nightmares. During one dream about Jamie, he wakes crying and holding a bleeding hand. Sand phials have been knocked to the floor and shattered, his fingers prickly with the fine broken crystals._

_“Pitch,” he tries, voice hoarse and trembling as he watches the sand sweep quickly into the gloom under the bed. He can never tell if Pitch is there or not. The sand moves without him, and Jack can’t sense him anymore, anyway._

 

* * *

 

The softness of snow should never be forgotten. Naked as the day he was born, Jack leapt into the drifts, cackling childishly as he bathed himself in snow angels on the slope, hair sparkling and freezing into eager spikes. Still not used to running with a round belly, he frequently tripped up and let the wind catch and drop him into virgin banks. Bunny watched awkwardly from the side, unable to come to terms with fertility in Jack’s barren world and struggling not to laugh as he constantly wobbled from the weight of his stomach. He’d gained some meat to his bones, but only just enough to soften his ruddied edges. It wasn’t ideal for the child, Bunny would think, but Jack and Pitch were both thinner than water, so really…

And Pitch, reproducing.

How’d he let that one get by him?

“Jack, I think it’s about time we got going. The kids’ll only be out for another hour.” He wasn’t sure to what he’d directed his voice. Jack kept disappearing into the white drifts like a shark, weaving under the snow expertly as he would in his own tunnels. And he may have been a prankster, but his current condition greatly impeded his stealth. Ghostly skin had become creamy and pink, always dusted with a faint, rosy blush, from his kneecaps to the tip of his nose, and betrayed him as it peaked above the snow line. He was comely, Bunny had to admit. Were he younger, he might have said “attractive,” even “breathtaking,” but he liked to think himself too old to dabble, and Jack much too… Jack, really. Must have been nice to have charm and free time like the dethroned Nightmare King, or whatever Pitch was daring to call himself after having his bony tuckus royally throttled.

He dropped a light package into the snow, Jack’s hand emerging comically from a pristine snow bank to grab it. The parcel was instantly snatched into the snow, and after much rustling and a few labored curses, a long, high whine echoed amid the trees.

“ _Seeerriously?!_ ” Bunny peeked over the top of the bank to find Jack fighting with the worn pair of trousers he’d thought to bring. The boy thrashed his legs, but couldn’t get the pants up past his milky thighs, belly tense and defiant under the siege of angry fingers and leather belt strings. Bunny couldn’t help it. He doubled over with a mighty guffaw, laughing harder as Jack screeched in playful indignation at the injustice of it all. And when the fight in him was spent, as his energy quickly was, these days, he collapsed bonelessly into the snow, whining as the trousers lay innocently undone, halfway down his legs.

“Ach, oh, that… I haven’t laughed like that… Oh, my. Oh, my…” Jack turned to him with a devilish glare, face pink and bright with mirth, lips flushed a deep red. Bunny kept himself in check and fumbled for the discarded package, withdrawing a long blue woman’s tunic. He tossed it at Jack and let him dress in peace, sniggering helplessly at the childish pleas for another pair of pants, and openly laughing again when the belt he’d provided was almost painfully tight on the last hole. There were no other clothes Bunny had that could suit his tiny frame without trailing five feet behind. Jack really was not meant to support another life, and the challenge it posed to his carefree nature appeared staggering.

“Do you have the staff?” He asked, brushing snow out of his hair and glowing with life. Bunny smiled past his gulp and turned so the boy could see its place next to his boomerang. He didn’t expect the pounce. He stumbled forward at Jack’s unusual weight, arms flailing and trying not to harm.

“ _Get off!_ ” He attempted grabbing one of Jack’s spidery limbs, but the boy was harder to catch than a leprechaun and twice as feisty. Bunny stopped a shiver when soft fingers touched his ear and a wet mouth leaned in, breath tickling the sensitive hairs,

“Come _onnnn_ , I’m _pregnant_. If I have to walk there, that’ll be all my energy for _the day_. Give us a ride, won’t you?”

Bunny couldn’t help but smile at the giggle following “us,” flattening his ears in submission to Jack’s wiles and allowing him to fold his arms and legs safely about his torso.

“Alright. But **no** funny business. And don’t yank the fur!”

Jack only laughed, petting him too sweetly to bear, “What, did you just have it dry-cleaned?”

Were Bunny a less stubborn stick in the mud, he might have relented that Jack’s companionship was the best thing to happen to him in years, certainly since he regained his powers and sealed Pitch down below. Though that didn’t stop the bastard from getting his creepy hands on the one thing Bunny was currently taking joy in. He didn’t stop to consider the fact that without Pitch’s unseemly interference, Jack’s belly wouldn’t be pressing so splendidly against his back, nor would his scent be so heavy and wanting. In fact he was vehemently denying it with every ragged breath of his being, and losing the fight frankly because he was _grateful_ to Pitch. Jack was alright on his own, but carrying a child, he was magnificent. Bunny found himself laughing at the most stupid of jokes, walking as slowly as Jack deemed easy on his nausea. Turning too much in the wind had upset his stomach. Bunny should have stopped him, but he didn’t have the heart.

The park where the children were was tucked in a sudden valley between two hills. A low ridge sloped gently down one, ecstatic kids running up and sliding down it on bright plastic sleds, the snow packed nearly into ice after days of play. Jack brightened at the fun they were having, squirming to get Bunny to set him down and staggering as he tried to jump, misjudging his angle and relying on a firm paw to straighten him out. He was trembling, he was so giddy, eagerly accepting the cloak Bunny proffered and demanding his staff so he could walk more surely.

Bunny watched him run off with the children, ears flattening at Sophie’s delighted scream as she ran towards him, Jamie jogging tiredly after. His only warning was a careless

“WHOOP!” before Jack barreled into his chest and sent him tumbling with a happy screech. Bunny busied himself with Sophie. It was Easter in a few months, anyway. He needed to know which chocolates his best girl wanted.

 

* * *

 

“Hi, Ja—”

“Hi.” Jack’s cheeks blazed red, Jamie’s brow going up in confusion as he went to flick away snow and found the skin heated, Jack leaning into his touch and closing his eyes. Water gathered at his lashes as he nuzzled the chilly palm more, a tight smile on his face.

“It’s been awhile.”

“Yeah. I… I’m real sorry, kiddo.” Jamie’s eyes doubled in size as Jack began to shake, his lip curling as he stifled a sob.

“Whaaa, are you hurt, Jack, why are you crying?!” Jamie leaned up, fussing over him, shocked to see how small Jack was in his lap, hunched vulnerably against his shoulder. He glanced vulnerably back at Bunny as white fingers clenched his parka, but the Guardian only laughed at him, yelling at Jack to stop being hormonal.

“Shut up!” He sobbed feebly, only crying harder when Jamie reached a nervous hand around his back in a clueless attempt to comfort him. When Jack only wept harder, he flinched back as if stung, but Jack shouted through his sobbing to please hug him, that he’d missed him, so Jamie gave in, and let the rumpled Guardian use his shoulder to hide his face. He tucked a hand behind a white head, rocking slightly and soothing him like he did his sister when she had nightmares,

“It’s okay, you’re okay. I missed you too, Jack.”

Jack hiccupped and drew away, wiping his eyes in such a cute fashion that Jamie smiled again, rubbing his shoulder and trying to get him to look up.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have been gone so long.”

“Shh, it’s fine, Jack. You don’t need to worry. I’ll never stop believing in you.”

Jack thrust backward, gazing up at Jamie with a wet, red face, brows knitted and eyes wide in gratefulness, and Jamie nearly hit himself to find he’d unlocked new material to cry over. He listened sympathetically as he was begged forgiveness and offered any number of snow days he wanted, unlimited snowballs during a fight and other kid things. Jack stumbled through his words with staggered sobs,

“I-I-I d-don’t-even know-how long-it’s beeeennn…!”

“About two years. It’s fine, Jack, really. We got plenty of snow.”

Jack began a new spiel of apologies and rants about Jamie’s amazing coolness for being his first believer. Jamie winced to think of that night when he was fifteen, Jack writhing on his bed and spreading… something in the room. Something so potent that he’d had to wash his sheets and return to the shower shortly after. He chalked that up to puberty, which was doing him no favors with Jack rocking into him like that, legs astride his waist and utterly dependent upon him. He wasn’t sure if he should have been thankful or mollified that Bunny picked Jack off him and let him sob into his own shoulder, sparing a gracious wink at Jamie’s obvious blush as he carried the quivering blue bundle out to the other kids.

Since when had Jack worn a cloak? And whatever had been pressing against Jamie’s stomach was certainly new, but maybe that had been the awkward positioning. He hadn’t realized how much he’d missed Jack, even though he was a teenager and should have been focusing on other things. He’d truly hugged him tighter than he’d intended, from how hard Bunny had had to tug to lift him up.

Two years and Jack still loved him to death.

Jamie couldn’t have been happier.

 

* * *

 

Daylight flickered weakly from the vents, choked by the evening above. The sand was alive and nervous, restricted by its connection to its master, swirling uselessly in a shimmering miasma which crept into every room. The nightmares were passing Europe, by now, and only an hour or so from Jack. Pitch lurked from passage to passage, haggard and vague, expressions shifting too quickly for his form to bear. First, the robe grew a fringe; loose shadows writhing at the mercy of his tumult. Then they smoked and faded, the border between reality and his torture indistinguishable. He forgot in his worry the humanity Jack said had charmed him, lost to his thoughts and frankly terrified for the first time in years.

He could bet on the rabbit, but the boy was trouble.

Jack was more stable, now, anyway. Most of their nights were spent sleeping peacefully next to each other. He’d been so weary, lately, for how much he glowed. Pitch may have been weaker, technically, but the strain of supporting a growing life was taking its toll. Jack was, ultimately, human. He had not been designed for such a burden. But he bore it, and wore it, breathtakingly well.

Pitch stirred and his robe snapped, lying undisturbed on the floor as though it had always been. He glanced over his shoulder, the silver of his collar stiff against his sore neck, and muttered tiredly to himself,

“I’ve already lost everything else because of him. Don’t tell me I’m losing my head, too.”

His wanderings brought him repeatedly back to the throne room, grey eyes narrowing at the shade of nightmares slowly crawling across the Atlantic, white-knuckled in waiting. A few blue lights sparked in America, where Jack must be. He edged closer to the globe, touching them experimentally, watching them sputter lazily with tentative belief. His hatred for humans was fanned as he observed their influence, their importance to Jack. The constant leech of energy from his center wavered the tiniest bit, and shrank, Jack supporting himself more and exerting more influence over their child.

Who would it look like?

“You’d better not be frivolous,” he spoke softly, thinking of Jack’s lighthearted attitude. Pitch’s child was to succeed him, if the day came. It couldn’t be throwing snowballs all afternoon.

Jack had consistently failed to tempt him into thinking of the future, bewildered that for all his partner’s scheming, the elder took no interest in discussion about the child. This was the first time Pitch had truly spoken aloud about it, even if it was only to himself. Jack’s callous assertions about names and upbringing had never sparked conversation, though he purposely embellished them to elicit outrage. Pitch always maintained his cool. He was reticent about accepting Jack as a parent, large as he was, now, and in spite of the incessantly endearing nesting he’d been doing.

He avoided a strip of frost as he passed Jack’s quarters, ignoring the delight of his breath as it appeared before him, a confirmation of his existence. Jack was always there for him, even when he wasn’t. And that, that had to prove _some_ responsibility in the boy.

But, then again, he _was_ a boy, and always would be. Heart, dreams, and actions, Jack would never pass adolescence. Chalk that up on the side of Pitch’s argument, and he had fairly convincing logic against Jack making a good parent, at least to a very young child. Recklessness and frailty never go well together.

 

* * *

 

They played until Sophie got cold and asked to go home, complained that it was a long walk back and the trail didn’t have lights. She still had nightmares about the shadows even though, consciously, she knew she was safe. Jamie promised her they would after a couple of runs down the hill, aching to go with Jack at once and have the wind push them off a ramp. He’d never been able to reproduce that first magical ride Jack had sent him on, and he was dying to try it at least once more in his life. Of course, Jack heartily agreed, although miffed that Jamie was so much taller than him now, there was no other option than for him to essentially sit in the boy’s lap, rather than hold him as he’d done years ago.

The path up the hill was staggeringly long, and the ice kept Jack slipping and relying on Jamie’s weight to carry him. It was too dangerous to use the wind so close to a ledge. He avoided the barrage of concerns, Jamie offering between every anxious comment to carry him, or stop the whole thing, but Jack was adamant that he would perform his Guardian duties of fun-bringing and whatever, much to the boy’s distress.

When they reached the top, Jack whistled through his heavy breaths, hands instinctively cradling his belly under the cloak to reassure himself it was still there, still safe. Jamie watched him carefully from his doubled-over position, panting with his hands on his knees as Jack looked out over the woods and the town. His pond was barely a speck amid the black crags of the treetops. An orange sunset glinted magically off the water, and the frozen horizon sparked into frosty flames licking the sunlight. Jack’s skin and hair illuminated in kind, soft icy spikes sharpening into gold and red, the pink of his skin bronzed into mortality. Jamie swallowed and stood properly, listening to Jack’s even, soothing breaths to calm himself.

“I remember,” Jack’s hands drew gracefully into the air, the edge of his cloak fluttering to reveal a shaded blue bump, “I used to come up here all the time with you kids. I don’t even know some of the younger ones, now.”

Jamie continued staring, bewildered by Jack’s beauty and the mystery of their two years apart. Jack looked over his shoulder, white teeth flashing in contempt,

“I really should have been better to you, kiddo. This wasn’t fair at all.”

The ledge wasn’t strong enough for Jamie, but he reached out and Jack fell toward him, away from the drop. His hands were small and white, the knuckles not as pronounced as when they’d first met.

“Do spirits get older?” he asked quietly, puzzling over the changes in his closest friend. Jack tried to pull away to answer, but Jamie held him close, even undoing his ski jacket to press the smaller body tighter to his own. He delighted in the warm shiver that slid through the other, at the telling curve of his smooth stomach.

“No. But we can… change, I guess.”

“So that’s…”

“Yeah,” Jack whimpered happily, sneaking one of Jamie’s anxious hands to his belly, sighing as it finally touched him, “yeah.”

Jamie simply stood there, unable to allow Jack to leave, stunned by his condition. Beyond the dozens of questions plaguing his mind, and instead of the heartwarming glee he should have known, he felt only a deep chill, and found himself unable to reciprocate Jack’s happiness. The din of cries and play below faded into a constant ringing, the sun dipping lower and closer to the horizon. Jamie glanced over his shoulder at the long shadow he made, and found Jack’s curiously parted from it, though he kept them fiercely connected.

“… who?” he finally managed, feigning a gentle smile as his imagination worked overtime to turn his stomach. He permitted Jack to look up from his shoulder, and reveal the bump in its entirety. His fists clenched in the coarse wool of the other boy’s cloak. Jack looked uncomfortable, struggling to speak.

“Well,” he breathed, avoiding eye contact, “it’s not like _that_. Completely. There is… someone.”


	8. The Triad

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jamie expresses his opinion of Jack's choices. Pitch picks up the pieces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: graphic. Ohhhh so very graphic.

“There’s someone?”

Jack peeked back up at him, gnawing on his lip. He was never the nervous type. He was carefree nearly to the point of being morally neutral. No topic should scare him from speaking. A breathless laugh and more lip-chewing signaled an invitation to guess, it seemed. Jamie snorted and yanked him into a looser hug.

“You don’t need to be nervous. A least it’s not Pitch,” he snorted, trying to get the other to laugh for real. But Jack tensed, fingers white as they gripped Jamie’s puffy coat. Slowly, he released him, prying the desperate clutch from his shoulders and stepping back, matching their lonely shadows. Jack stared weakly after him, eyes hopeful but delicate, awaiting the dreadful verdict.

“You and Pitch. You’re with Pitch.”

“Jamie,” Jack tried to grab his hand, but the boy jerked back in disgust, mildly vindicated by the broken trust in the spirit’s eyes as he stumbled, the hand that had reached out going to cradle the gentle curve of the abomination between them. He flinched without meaning to, breaths coming hard and fast as his hatred rapidly processed.

“Jamie, please,” Jack begged, all beauty and pleas and vulnerable to Jamie’s every move. He hadn’t used his magic yet, the staff barren of ice rather than glittering and crackling with energy. Jack looked beautiful; weak enough to want to protect. And soiled.

“Pitch,” he spat, thinking of the nightmares Sophie had had since those days, of staying up to calm her and remind her that they’d won, that he was imprisoned and worse and nothing could hurt them ever again. That Jack had stood up for them, loved them, and would always love them, no matter what. He couldn’t tell if the ice in his chest was intentional on Jack’s part; if his magic had taken a crueler note and Jamie, his most sacred and first believer, was unwittingly suffering the side effects as it crawled inside and froze him whole.

“Did he force you?” he asked, turning his anger and fear entirely toward Jack, trying to forget the nights spent huddled under his blanket in impotent fear, too terrified to even run crying to his mother. The personification of fear, itself, all seven arrogant feet of it. The only way he could have accepted any of it were if Jack had been forced; had suffered too much to put into words, but from the look of him, unmoving and wide-eyed, Jamie had an idea that he had been entirely betrayed.

“Are you with him?” he murmured, sending the other back a step. Jack kept one hand cautiously on his belly and Jamie ripped it off, crushing it at the wrist. The elder looked up, bewildered by the tears in the boy’s eyes, by the shameful red rage on his face. Jack was never so subdued, so quiet. His whole existence had been devoted to capturing attention, to winning believers and friends and the awe of children. And he’d been defiled. Was this what growing up was like? Jamie had happily considered himself as a “man,” of late, but his weakness to his own childhood, to the nights spent curled in terror and praying for Jack, who never came, to save him, rose up and conquered the joy he felt at their reunion. The disloyalty stung more than the freezing air on his chest, than the water on his face as it chilled in the climbing winter fog.

“I’m with the Guardians, and with you, Jamie. I will **always** be there for you.” Jack said slowly, wrist limp and submissive in the glare of the boy’s fearful wrath. Jamie laughed and released him, heading back toward the other children, shaking his head.

“You know what? You already left. Don’t worry about it. Just go.”

Jack ran after him, the Wind sending a mighty gale to keep Jamie from descending the hill.

“Jamie, he’s different, now, _trust_ me!”

“He’s not, Jack. If you’d bothered to come see us, you would have known.”

“He hasn’t done anything, I swear! I’ve been with him this _whole time_ , he—”

The Wind stopped as Jamie rounded on him, the forest quiet as the children stared up at them in wonderment tinged with fear. The whole time. Doing what? He eyed the pregnant belly in evil rapture as Jack slowed and protected it, lips tense. Jamie smirked in spite of his own withered heart,

“Maybe if you’d cared enough to stop **fucking** him for _ten minutes_ , none of this would have happened.” He fidgeted under the weight of his words, clearly unaccustomed to swearing and taking double the pleasure in using profanity. Jack had essentially committed an act of treason. Why weren’t the Guardians interfering? What sort of people would allow Pitch to be with Jack? And Bunny, a spring spirit, must have known about Jack’s pregnancy all along, and when he turned his head there the traitor was, frolicking with his friends and beloved sister, untouched by his disgust, his need to escape.

“Jamie, _I’m sorry_. It had to be this way—”

Jack stepped back again when he looked on him. The human ran a shaking hand over his face, wondering what was on it that could have frightened the other so. The sound of Jack’s heart was like a glacier cracking, the momentum of destruction driving it into the sea, but Jamie remained silent as the mountain. Blue eyes shined pitifully in rare begging,

“Please, Jamie. You’re my first believer. No one is more important than _you_.” He tried to stress, but Jamie couldn’t look at him for long. Unconsciously, his gaze always slipped back to the perfect round belly, causing his mouth to tighten and the weeping leather of his gloves to creak under clenched fists. Nothing would be more important than the maggot inside of him, once born. A mix of fear and whatever Jack had become, bearing Pitch’s features and Jack’s precious brand of cruelty. Jamie couldn’t stand the feel of his own skin. Nightmares from the past several years crept over his vision, twisting Jack’s form into the ravaged figure he’d often seen, of tearstained cheeks and scarred thighs twitching to hide the evidence of shame. Countless mornings waking both to tears and sickening arousal. He’d dreamt of them being at Pitch’s mercy. He’d never thought it would be like this.

“I don’t even know why I believe in you.”

A cautiously stifled sob chased after him as he descended, steps too wide and too hard on the ice of the hill. It took one quiet crack for the forest to go silent, Jack’s breath hitching as Jamie tried to look up, and the sickening tilt of the lifting world around him left him weightless in the fall.

“JAMIE!”

Jack screeched, tumbling down after him. The ridge ended abruptly below him in a reef of boulders streaked with snow. Jamie’s shoulder hit a frozen branch and he grunted shrilly as it tore open, the world lighting suddenly around him, frozen and stiff as the rocks hurdled closer.

 

* * *

 

The first spikes of pain shot through him gracefully, easy to ignore as he summoned his power to the sight of Jamie cracking sickeningly on the rocky shelf below. After that, it entered him in waves, causing him to lose his footing on the short, sheer cliff, tottering over sharp rocks to slice his feet as the Wind soared deftly around him. Ice crawled over the crack in Jamie’s skull, encased the shattered remnants of his shoulder. When Jack reached him, the other children were already screaming and scampering over the teetering rocks, some running home shouting for parents through tears.

Jack kept his magic circling around Jamie, searching his torn coat for more wounds and hyperventilating when the boy would not respond to his yelling. Bunny bounded onto the rocks with Sophie sliding off his back, crying after her brother and urging them to bring him home, get him to a hospital. The magic lifted Jack’s hair and drew sparks through the dusky atmosphere in his panic, a storm mounting as the broken body was torn away from him and straddled over Bunny’s great back.

“ **Jack, you have to calm down**!” came the rushed words and Bunny gripped his shivering shoulders, Sophie climbing on and ready to leave. Jack could barely hear him over the screaming children and Sophie’s own rare sobs.

“You can’t use magic. Get back to Pitch, **now**.” And with that, Bunny leapt to the ground, disappearing into a sudden tunnel as the kids ran in his wake, a few shouting back at Jack,

“WHAT DID YOU DO?!”

“He shoved him,”

“He threw Bennett off the cliff,”

“I saw Jamie crying!”

The lot of them scurried through the hills back to Burgess, opposite his pond as a flurry worked into a ferocious blizzard, ripping hungrily at the limbs that had broken Jamie’s arm and smoothing over the dark blood painting the rocks. Jack let the snow pelt him, eyes wide, unable to calm himself as the Wind shrieked Bunny’s words back at him, the first searing stab of lightning striking the ridge and sending half of it crashing thunderously in a cascade beside him. Another lit a tree and scorched off the snow, burning the trunk from within and splitting the sides with bubbling sap gushing down between the fissures. The Wind kicked up and soothed the bubbling pitch into a hard crust, like lava spilling over the plains.

The sun sank fully below the hill. One minute and that was it. Jamie turned away from him, eyes narrowed and mouth a thin sneer in oblivious mockery of a face Jack had come to know too well.

Nightmares gathered at the brink of the storm, an isolated thing sweeping the Burgess forest into a mad white cell, Jack at the mercy of his power. The pain dashed him in waves, sending him careening against the rock wall with a trembling gasp, hands dropping the staff to grip his stomach.

- _ack!_

He shivered at the weight of the pain, how the howling Wind bleached into a high whine, unable to comprehend any change in the white.

“ _AH!_ ” He cried out, lips and eyes wet as the pain brought him to his knees, the power of the storm growing, energy draining from him faster; his fingers unable to reach for the staff and only clutching the now-bare skin of his panging stomach. He moaned and clenched his teeth, legs spread and pressing into the rocks until they, too, cracked under his wrath, face contorting as he gnashed through his pain.

_-Ja… -op!_

_-Jack, stop!_

“JACK, STOP!”

Pitch’s face swallowed his vision with grey and black, the silver of his eyes searching him desperately for wounds, feeling at his aching belly and instantly recoiling as he screamed. He couldn’t look anymore, the last wave sending him limp as his nerves broiled at any touch, the world growing black while the Wind hissed to a deathly halt.

 

* * *

 

The next few days passed in a fog, a vague grey blur lingering at his side and bathing his sweating face in snow, his muscles too weak to lean in and gather the last drops with a parched violet tongue. The pain only grew the first two days, a white fist clenching gnarled grey fingers in fear, dry lips babbling uselessly through the shocking waves and begging for too many things at once.

Every few hours, it would mount and garner a hoarse shriek from his torn throat, followed by breathless sobs as his magic cleansed him and more weight slid broken and wet from his body. He could barely comprehend it beyond the fire in his fingertips, the swollen inferno in his abdomen. Each time, he was cleaned, until on the third day he managed to calm his breaths at last, chest aching from the force of his panic and legs jellied with their upright positioning.

_Can you hear me?_

“Jack?”

Feverish and faint, Jack turned weakly to see Pitch sitting beside him, the distance in his eyes dulling them from days at his bedside. Tears welled up at the sight and all he could manage was a feeble squeeze at those gentle fingers, a whimper rising in him as they withdrew, cultured steadily by growing fear. Pitch’s gaze did not fall on him again, instead parceling out his clammy limbs into careful checks, never taking in the whole shivering mass or his wanting glances.

The stone beneath him was dark and wet from constant washing, no drop of blood to be seen. When Jack opened his eyes fully, he saw a bowl and rag at the foot of the slab, splotched pink and red and glaring at him to face the devastation he’d wrought on them both.

When his arms stiffened, scrabbling anxiously at the rock as he tried to lift himself, to escape the sight of the bowl, his legs would not obey, and instead suffered a terrible spasm. He choked on vomit as his stomach churned and _pressed_ , the pain wringing and releasing him with a tiny, slick feeling.

“Oh god. Oh god. No. No, no, no, Pitch. No. Pitch, please, _Pitch_ ,” he whined, unwillingly absorbing the blank expression of the elder as a silver gaze slid between his thighs, one long, graceful hand reaching soundlessly for the rag.

Jack screeched and tried to throw himself from the rock, into a cavern, a crevice, his nest where they’d cradled each other and he’d whispered ecstatically, longingly, of their beautiful future. Claws dug remorselessly into his arms, dragging him sobbing back to the stone. He fought and punched, quickly stalled into a begging, dolorous cry as another wave of pain hit him, another contraction passing the broken remains of their promise.

“Oh god, please, _no, no, No, NO, NO!_ ” He dissolved into more sobbing, bare, white arms hiding his face and hips flinching fearfully as the rag was brought to his slick flesh, washing off the mess and dripping innocently as it was wrung into the wide brass bowl.

_Plop_

_Plop_

When it was done, Pitch must have, thankfully, dried his hands, as the one that pried Jack’s shivering fist from further damaging his face was soft, and dry, and remarkably cool. Almost icy.

Would it have had his powers?

Or the crinkle in Pitch’s brow as he gazed at him in emotional exhaustion?

An empty glance passed over him, scrutinizing the sweat beaded over his forehead, the agonized lines pressed deep into young flesh. He murmured in the darkness, voice careful and quiet; detached.

“Are you well enough to talk?”

Jack couldn’t bear to look at him, knowing that for each time he did, the gaze would slide off of him like the water cooling on his thighs. He shook his head and broke down, swallowing as much sound as he could to spare Pitch more stabs at the dreams they’d shared. No use crying over a nightmare when it’s already passed. At his rejection, Pitch rose again, hand seeping through Jack’s covetous grabs like smoke, appearing on the other side with a smudge of shadow; ambiguous in shape as when they’d first started this charade. He gathered the bowl and swept into the black, leaving Jack to assemble what was left to be held.

Three years.

Three years spent in these caves, locked together.

In one minute, undone. Frayed at fresh cuts where the knots were sliced loose.

And Jamie.

What could have happened?

He grew sick and just barely leaned over the edge, vomiting into the bowl of snow Pitch must have traveled to the surface to get. Suffering Manny’s hateful glare and the threat of the Guardians ending him at first sight. All for a bowl of snow. Something to keep the fever away. The sickness that was the last dregs of their child. He vomited again, morbidly curious as to why no blood made its way from his mouth when the whole of his body fired each organ into a gruesome boil.

_You’re Jack Frost._

Another heave.

 _You make a mess wherever you go_.

Another.

_In fact,_

He hid his face as Pitch entered once more, the elder spirit immediately staring at the now-melted bowl of precious snow.

**You’re doing it right now.**

Pitch set the freshened bowl and new rag by the stone, gliding silently over the white sandstone blocks of the floor. His hands had warmed back to their normal temperature, flaming as they caressed Jack’s lukewarm skin, grimacing at the ravaging fever.

“The Rabbit said another day, at most.” He said softly, speaking not to Jack but to whom, Jack could not comprehend. They were no longer three. To the spirit of their happiness, perhaps.

He was aloof again, but changed from before their deal. There was no scathing energy, no hatred toward Jack for what he and the Guardians had done to him. There was no fire in his movements, no arrogance in his tone. The shadows did not writhe or hiss in the corners, tug at his hair or threaten him with his own fears as cannon fodder. Rather, Pitch was slow. Understated.

Black not with contempt, but the stillness of mourning. The color of death.

Jack had not known death to be any one color, but to him it was the red spreading beneath him. The blood, his own and not, sluggishly funneling through the grooves in the stone, arching in energetic swirls as no liquid naturally should, the only evidence of any personality their child might have had. Creativity in the slumber of decay. Gratefulness for life even when cheated.

The bowl of melting, putrid snow disappeared, allowing the room to smell only of blood and sweat. Pitch took the rag in hand once more, wringing out the fresh spring water and drawing it haltingly toward Jack’s now-conscious body. He hadn’t yet touched the spoiled flesh, instead hovering over the stone block and Jack’s trembling thigh with a flicker of recognition in his eyes; another grim duty thrust ruthlessly upon him. Jack had an idea of what it might be. The barren, loathsome flatness of his stomach was nearly complete; only a few more pushes and he would be freed.

A flash of tarnished silver. Pitch saw his movements before he did.

“Jack, lie down.”

“I want to see.” His voice came husky but determined. A grey hand kept him easily contained, at the center of his breast where his heart had dropped out. He swatted at it, clawed shakily at the warm flesh, nails torn from battling with the rock’s surface during the worst of his contractions.

“Let me see,” he said more firmly, scooting and rising up on his hips, fumbling with Pitch’s solid wrist. The other’s free hand swept down to gather what was left between his legs and his fighting became all the fiercer, teeth bared and eyes watering as his kicks and thrashing came in earnest. Pitch’s mouth tightened and the hand that had gone to collect instead crashed viciously against Jack’s shoulder, shoving him perhaps too forcefully against the slab. Jack shouted at him and kept clawing, kicking and wailing as another, smaller wave of pain permeated his limbs and sucked a flinching breath into his lungs. Arms that had restrained now held him, and his helpless attacks transformed into pleading handfuls of robe, tugging Pitch closer as if he were a balm to cure the pain.

He gritted his teeth as the strongest wave crested, gulping haltingly as a press of muscle shook loose another scrap. Pitch’s chin was balanced over his head, the point of it turning slightly to view the newest addition to Jack’s gallery of torture.

Neither of them expected him to be able to wrench away, Pitch’s embrace dissolving and baring him again to the relentless cold of the cave.

Pitch should have acted faster, should have spirited away the evidence before Jack could thrash too much.

Pitch should have done a lot of things, he thought, but it seemed he no longer had the energy.

-

Jack’s breathing stopped.

He didn’t want to feel so sure about what he’d been expecting. Dredging for days in agony should have left him nearly empty. The bump he’d often wondered over, giggled at, worshipped, had already disappeared. And here he was left with its memory, hoping for what, exactly?

To see something terrible?

The extent of what he’d done?

At the very least, he’d imagined something recognizable. Something he could be sure came from him and deserved his anguish; that bore his and Pitch’s mark in such a way that they might properly mourn it. Love it for what it did, and would have given them. But he could not have even that.

Three little pieces.

One slightly larger than the others, lonesome in a sea of vibrant, curling red.

Poisoned red fronds, fractals of blood like the frost he could summon. The only gauge of his patronage.

Pitch’s grip on his arm could have shattered it then and there, could have forced him into another frenzy with pain given to him, not from him. Instead, he just sat there, watching the tiny fragments of flesh, waiting for them to do something. To ignite some storm of love and self-hatred inside of him. To verify that his suffering, his very existence, would not go unnoticed in the cosmic scheme.

They didn’t move.

They were small, and dark, and red.

“Jack,” Pitch soothed, or tried to soothe. Jack flinched, though unblinking, as the hold on his arm loosened. These were only the final fragments. The angry flush on his face drained to a sickly pallor, thoughts of Pitch attending to him, hiding the worst of it, floating in his mind.

What part of it had that piece been? Perhaps a rosy cheek, and the larger one long; a finger, then. What had he done to fracture it so, and leave the corpse as nothing they could bury?

Can spirits be buried?

Spirits can be forgotten. This would be forgotten, as well.

When Jack reached hypnotically for them, Pitch guided his hand back until it rested behind him. Jack jumped as his palm rested in the liquid, eyes flashing as Pitch stared after it, flicking between his face and the hidden palm warily. Unsure of how he would react. Preparing for the worst.

His fear made the air tremble, fingers spreading slowly through the mess, feeling it. When he believed he had the energy to see it, his arm was leaden and unsure, gaze unfocused and lips parted dumbly. He turned it very deliberately, halting at the first sign of red, too bright, almost fake, on his scarred finger.

Real, then.

Pitch drew in a hissing breath, holding his other hand and hunching as though punched. Jack stared mutely at the vivid gore dousing his hand, trying to reconcile it with the hope and joy he’d taken in its presence only days before. When it had been whole, inside of him, live and growing. It had taken root over two years ago. More than two years spent as his child.

And all he had to show for it?

Three little morsels.

“Where is the rest of it?” He asked gravely, hand sinking back into the puddle as gravity fell upon him and his blood pressure dropped. Pitch lowered him as carefully as possible to the stone, but could not budge the steadfast grip on his robe. A fist the color, and obduracy, of ice. Jack’s breaths came slow and shallow, bloodied fingers slipping as they formed a slick stance on the rock. Was the grittiness sliding beneath him sand or bone fragments? White and red. He could not tell. His voice rose, deceptively steady.

“Tell me where, Pitch.”

Pitch avoided him again, shadows rushing in from all around to cover the boy’s nakedness, creeping soundlessly up his thighs to draw away the mess. Jack fought him, hit at him, screamed in his ear and tried to close his legs, hands scrabbling to keep the three dear fragments close. For what, he couldn’t know.

When he felt the dry stone he shrieked, shadows receding and allowing him to beat fruitlessly at Pitch’s chest, grey hands staidly up and bared, only weakly grasping at Jack’s wrists, permitting the abuse with a long vacant stare from above. Jack crumbled into sobbing, head collapsed against Pitch’s heart as his fists continued their feeble assault, worn out but clean from the deft licks of the hungry shadows.

He hated the darkness for what it hid from him. Hated Pitch for what he hid from him.

The urge to go home would have had him calling the Wind to surge him to the surface, but it couldn’t possibly reach down this far, and for three years, _this had been_ his home. He would have nowhere else to go. Back to wandering. And for no reason other than his own mad loneliness, he hated Pitch for that, too.

“ _I hate you,_ ” he sobbed, muffled, into Pitch’s coarse robe. The arms around him stiffened, wounded, but closed more tightly, a warm cheek and nose resting, breathing in the scent of his soft, long hair.

“ _I hate you, I hate you,_ ”

“I know.” Pitch stopped him in his tracks, and he could feel the normally solid back quiver, the words hushed and trembling, “I know.”

Pitch only breathed after that, leaving Jack’s many questions unanswered, nursing his hatred, while his back continued to quiver, almost invisible in the soft, silver moonlight streaming in from above.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now go back and read the note at the beginning.


	9. Withered

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pitch's voice blooms in Jack's absence. Upon visiting Jamie, Jack races to an extreme conclusion.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It ain't whump if they like it.

Everything seemed blurred, grey, now. After days of pain, the transition between eager expectance and bereavement had itself become a state. The mire of their grief sucked in every word, every breath, and every movement, turning them slow and indefinite, weighted by the black atmosphere that had consumed them. Jack failed to distinguish his suffering from its physical end; all of it lumped together and served to remind him of what he’d lost. The passing of the corpse was cruel formality. All that came after was a lethargic sorrow, too heavy to allow them to leave, and too tense to permit them to talk. Heartache had poisoned their words.

He’d remained in Pitch’s embrace for hours, fingers stiff and freezing as his magic was released after years of dormancy, sparks forming in the darkness when his panic was reborn. He felt stronger, but couldn’t tell if that was the truth of it or if three years without using the staff had simply left him out of touch.

Sensitive.

Extremely sensitive.

Interpreting feelings and differentiating good from bad became difficult. It was all noise buzzing painfully in his head, stinging his retinas with white sparks and lapses in time. He drifted in and out, flinching awake usually when Pitch tried to interact. Before, he had reveled in Pitch’s touch because it was a connection; a conduit in the exchange of power and life. Now it made him ill. He had lost his glow in the darkness, what had lured Pitch to cover him, hold him; playfully smother him. His ice grew sharp and glassy and he hated it, long smooth surfaces replacing the playful frost he’d always had and revealing his flat, sterile stomach in too many angles to count. The fronds reminded him of his child’s only effect on the world, washed promptly away by Pitch’s invasive, obfuscating shadows. Now the ice formed thick walls, dividing him from anything that might aggravate his wounds, and in particular, dividing him from Pitch.

Below the antechamber, through a deep fissure was the room he’d occupied during his pregnancy. The delicate frosted arch of the entryway had melted and cast the stone a dull grey. The mirror of polished ice which had reflected the first signs of fruition was a murky puddle, seeping into the cracks.

It still smelled slightly of his heat and their mating. When he came near it, trying to find some comfort in the empty lair, some familiarity, his cheeks flushed and a flash of want wracked him so strongly he nearly puked. Memories rose of Pitch bent over him, his legs hooked over rail-thin hips, panting into the elder’s ear and pleading for his come. Bile simmered in his throat. He couldn’t think of anything like that, right now.

Right on cue, Pitch descended through the hole, the shadows of his robe licking the walls and fading into the grim fog brought on by the ice. In a moment, they would have been on each other. Instead, Jack was panting through tears, tugging at the hair that had grown over his eyes and trying to rip out the last physical remnant of his fertility. Elegant fingers clasped his wrists, but he was far stronger than Pitch, now. Stronger even than when they had started, he was sure. A bolt of electricity wove from the tip of his staff, oscillating in the air for a second before striking where Pitch had stood, sending the earth erupting into smoke and debris.

In exchange, a shadow whipped around his throat, dragging him off his feet but he singed it, the heat burning his fingers so badly he shrieked, encasing them in chunks of solid ice to quiet the burn.

The cave tilted and he spilled out over the top of the fissure, near the surface of the antechamber, firing blast after blast into the wave of shadows that vied to overtake him. Before long, they shrugged back into the corners, baring Pitch in the center with a fine trail of smoke. Fury crackled again at Jack’s extremities, sparking the dust in the air to ignite and shimmer, a fine sheen of ice covering him to protect his white skin from the flares.

Pitch never stopped staring at him, still refusing to look him in the eye, and Jack was ready to strike again, poising his staff like a harpy raises her sword, when whispered words came echoing through the chamber.

 _You’re beautiful_.

He faltered, choking on a sob and wincing as his tears boiled under heat of the sparks, nearly blinded by the hundreds of lights surrounding him. He just couldn’t get a handle on that damned magic. More importantly, he couldn’t begin to deal with Pitch, or the way he was looking at him; captivated but despaired. At once distrusting and something too painful to acknowledge.

He didn’t dare name it. Everything Pitch did was hateful. Evil. He’d probably been tricked all along. Nothing can grow in the sterility of winter. Nothing could bloom between solid ice and the inferno of lightning. Jack had been doomed from the start. And Pitch probably knew it, too.

He grabbed at his hair and pulled it again, arms close to his chest as he hunched and waited for the lights to stop so he could see Pitch properly, address him coolly or angrily or really in any way. But all he could manage was a dolorous screech, rocking the ancient cavern as the Wind dipped lightly into the vent above, and plucked him nimbly from the shadows.

 

* * *

 

The Wind dropped him at Jamie’s window, pushing him toward the glass and confused at the darkness within, the drawn curtains and locked sill. Jamie never kept his window locked, even if Jack technically could float on through. Jack was a mess, anyway. Seeing Jamie looking like this would probably just scare the boy, and he still hadn’t taken control of the damned sparks. He began to think they were only imaginary, but the heat of them couldn’t be. He wasn’t that damaged, yet, surely.

Time wasn’t terribly consistent in the caves, so he had no real gauge of how long it had been before he surfaced. The humid, temperate air felt like spring, but it was the dead of night, and the flowers were closed to his eye. Even the Moon would not reveal them, shadowed by the earth and lost among the stars. Jack felt more stranded than ever before, unable even to control his powers and suffering from their rabid change. It felt like they were fighting him, resisting any attempts to control and mete them. And when the lights swarmed him, blinding him to the stars that were his last chance at navigating, he lost it, and the sky clouded over.

 

* * *

 

Beautiful.

Well that hadn’t been the right time to say but he was, wasn’t he? Always. How could any creature resist the temptation to worship when he shined so brightly among the bleak? Winter conceals just as much as the darkness but he never could accept that, always blamed the shadows for something snow and ice have done since time immemorial. Jack was more beautiful than ever. If he didn’t see it to begin with, he certainly wouldn’t, now.

It hurt to look at him. To face what could not be mended. Perhaps Jack couldn’t see them but the wounds were fresh all over and the blood only iced, covered, never cleaned.

Pitch wants to wash it all away.

 

* * *

 

It takes a while to find the hospital. The last book Jack read was the bible by which his mother lovingly soothed him to sleep. And then he, his dead sister. Fumbling with the English language, something many spirits did not care to learn to read, left him reeling with a headache as he searched the signs in the bustling city, casting a wave of storm clouds across Pennsylvania. The temperature dropped and humans in short sleeves hurried inside. Jack checked several hospitals, landing finally in a parking lot as Sophie trudged in the main entrance carrying a tote bag. Jamie’s space blanket was folded hurriedly over the top.

It took ages to follow her without being noticed, hopping atop the elevator and peeking down through the grate, floating through air vents and darting behind medicine carts. He thought he was doomed to be discovered when a little girl gasped and grinned at him, but her expression quickly changed. She whined and clutched fearfully her father’s hand, ducking her face into his trench coat.

What must he look like?

Perhaps she saw the sparks.

He pursed his lips and tried to remember to smile, the storm outside growing thunderous far too close. Sophie set the bag on the beige tile floor, knocking softly and entering a wide door. Jack looked over her shoulder and saw Jamie covered in wires, machines beeping around him like the video games he’d attempted to hook him on. Jack wasn’t good with electrical things. They tended to short-circuit around him.

Keeping silent and hovering above the bed, he gazed down at the extent of Jamie’s wounds, things he hadn’t been able to see beyond the coat and snow pants.

His leg and arm were in thick casts, brown hair shaved back to reveal myriad black stitches scabbed with blood. Tubes connected to his elbow, his chest, down below and through his nose, his mouth. Jack had no idea what they were for, but Jamie’s breaths came slow and calculated, slothfully paced with one of the looming machines. Sophie sat at his bedside and pulled forth the blanket, thumping out the folds and draping it serenely over his unresponsive body. She checked his scabs, the alignment of the straps elevating his leg, rearranged his arms more comfortably, and reached behind him to fluff the giant pillow. The case was the same Santa pattern Jack had jokingly asked North to give him, one Christmas. His knuckles groaned as they clenched the staff tighter, lightning flashing high in the clouds above.

Sophie glanced out the window with bleary, sleepless eyes, waiting for another strike. Jack held his breath and counted, trying to think of Jamie’s wellbeing and relax, but the air started to spark around him again, catching dust particles and evaporating them in impossible heat. His breathing increased. He shouldn’t have come to the surface. He could stay in the darkness and avoid Pitch. Hell, it was hard to _find_ Pitch down there, sometimes.

She pulled out a book and began to read. He wanted to ask her everything; what had happened to Jamie, what were the tubes, what month was it, why were there dozens of cards and no other visitors?

The memory of that long, vicious crack, Jamie’s blood spilling in hypnotic tides onto the frozen rocks, overcame him and stiffened his grip on the staff. The lights flickered. Sophie looked up anxiously and stifled a shuddering scream.

She held her hand to her mouth and dropped the book, shaking in terror.

Why did she tremor? He touched his face and flinched at the static that shocked him. He lowered and tried to touch Jamie, but she shrieked and he lost his nerve.

The windows shook with the force of the lightning just outside, blinding her and sending the sparks into a frenzy. She yelled and fell over her brother as Jack pushed out through the wall and rocketed past the massive bolts, zigzagging through downtown and leaving a wake of charred pavement and broken, iced windows. His face burned with shame and fear as the Wind brought him back to the pond. The entirety of it froze the second he touched it, something that had never happened, and he dropped the staff as he fell, colliding against the solid ice and furiously scrubbing against it, polishing the spiked surface until he could see his face.

Sunken eyes with papery skin, the bags so deep they were nearly bruises. Blue irises had faded almost to marble white, lit with stray cerulean remnants like spikes of lightning. His lips were a dark purple and bitten from worrying, swollen and plump in a mockery of lust. Rather than clothing, which he had forgotten in his haste to escape the lair, scales of polished ice graced his legs, frosted to an opaque bluish white and deadly sharp. The ice had expanded to cover his chest, shifting with his movements like armor, and his hair stood at odd angles from his pulling, unwashed and stiff when he ran a mollified hand through the snowy spikes.

He sucked in a frightened breath as the ice crept further along his body, shielding him from the increasing light and heat of the sparks. He hugged his knees and wished himself better over and over, afraid to look back at his reflection, frozen to the surface of the pond.

What now?

No one would recognize him.

He looked dead. Of course they’d screamed at the sight of him.

In desperation, he pulled at the scales of the armor, jabbed at it with a conjured spike, but it only grew in retaliation, slicing his hands and glinting maliciously in the evening light, painted with dark blood.

He hated blood. He hated himself.

“ _Wind_ ,” he gasped into his knee, “ _Antarctica_.”

And she lifted him into the sky, staff and all.

 

* * *

 

It didn’t take long to piece it together. The Nightmares _hunted_ the sister for months, scraping memories from the muddled gore inside her skull and leaving the mess of emotion straighter than they’d found it. Compelled by fear. She wasn’t an uncommon meal for them, oh, no. Pitch had _directed_ them to feed off the siblings in particular because revenge is sweet, but it was easy. Jack _did_ bring a certain amount of fear into play, didn’t he? The adrenaline of a steep sledding hill. The threat of a white-out blizzard. And wherever he went, nowadays, it swirled in the air around him, and maybe that was the reason he winced and squinted as if someone were tossing lit matches at him, one by one, shielding his eyes from something Pitch could not see.

The children were growing and growing vulnerable without Jack’s protection. It was natural that his appetites should occupy surrendered territory, or rather, resume occupation. Jack was with him for, what, three years? Three years to rebuild his reputation in Jack Frost’s precious absence. It wasn’t Pitch’s fault that the winter couldn’t last; that the snow would melt. Certainly not. All wounds must breathe.

What is concealed must eventually be recovered. Pretending Jamie would be fine in spite of the dozens of poor test results was simply foolish. Misplaced hope. The fear that was stricken into the girl the moment he fell was only refined by the brief relief of doctors and science and all that modern medicine had done to trick man into believing the evil and misfortune in the world could be conquered.

There will always be fear.

And the expression on her face when she learned he was dying was _marvelous._

Of course, none of this was her fault, but by extension of her suffering, the boy was suffering as well. He was (or had been) righteous as Jack, himself, and ever her caretaker. When the final verdict passed, “ _Comatose. Unresponsive._ _Brain-dead_.” Pitch shook with vindication. A life for a life is a rule older than himself, and though no paltry human existence could amount even to the _potential_ of what would have been, **should** have been, it was better than the nothingness Jack would have preferred; the unjust lack of a sentence, no, Pitch couldn’t have _that_.

It was clear that Jamie deserved something worse than death, but had passed the penalty on for his beloved sister to shoulder.

How righteous is that?

And unlike the glamorous depictions of Boogeymen in human tales, of fiends sneaking into the uncannily still sleep of the dying, the immobile, there was really nothing Pitch could do with a coma. It was a lapse in existence. The space between heartbeats. He nearly destroyed the antechamber when he realized Jamie’s unconscious mind had died, too. There was no reason in punishing a vegetable, no mind to absorb the terror he wished so painfully to inflict. Even the mares cowed to his moods, shivering and licking their chops with the taste of his malice, his stagnating wrath.

They followed Jack, too, not that he made it difficult.

Bizarre winter tempests were lighting up the Eastern seaboard. Snow in Georgia, electrical storms ripping apart Philadelphia, a little bad weather bringing mankind to its _knees_.

Although Jack’s beauty could do that any day.

Pitch knows just about everything negative, everything that causes pain, and without Jack about to remind him of what, exactly, had been lost, he could then lose himself. Physical form had been too difficult, lately. A body which has known another wants most deeply to touch, and Jack had unmistakably, ruthlessly, denied him. The din of hissing in the shadows was the turmoil of his thoughts, so he wiped them clean, focusing all of his nervous energy into his work. And a glorious year for fear it was. Sophie did not sleep for several days. Nearly ended up in the hospital, herself.

He wanted to dance on their graves.

He wanted Jack to see that the last thing attaching him to the outside world was incomplete, fragile, and dead.

But that line of thinking is very dangerous, because there is something that can shatter all this strength he’s stubbornly gained, all this overdone evil façade, something that shares those mournful characteristics and he’s interred it deeper in the caves than even the shadows go. Deeper than he cares to go. Hidden. Forgotten. His last tenuous connection to another being snuffed before fulfillment.

It was his intention that Jack would forget what had happened, but not all of it. Not what had bloomed outside of the terms of their agreement. Not what he had come to value so immensely that Jack leaving was like having part of him sliced out, the bone left bare and rotting longer and longer as the boy stayed away. No. Pitch had never asked for _that_. Then again, he had never wanted it in the first place, but it was more like a dream than he could have ever imagined. Things like passion and sex and whispered words in the dark were only clumsy demonstrations of this power Pitch had but vaguely known, still refused to name. And he never would.

It was the nail in the casket. Jack would not accept him like that ever again.

So what was Pitch to do with all that he’d abandoned?

 

* * *

 

Southern winds were not nearly as kind. It could be that they simply weren’t used to spirits encroaching on their territory. The North Wind left him to their whims when she could blow no further, and they had sent him where they’d seen him last.

The crevasse.

Looming above him as he touched down was the macabre, swirling masterpiece he and Pitch had formed a decade before. Stray grains of sand had managed to wriggle free, but the tempestuous winds kept them from traveling back to their master. Instead, they gathered around the base of the gory statue, sprinkling the snow with shining soot. Escaping the ice grain by grain. Jack barely had the strength to keep his staff in hand. He hated it. He hated how his magic reminded him of Pitch, how it changed and rounded on him, battling him at every step. He hated that while he once found the statue hideous, it was now a memento. A relic of a time to which he wished he could return.

Behind him, the crack in the ice shelf where Pitch had thrown him was nearly smoothed over, frost climbing into the deep fissures until they were light grooves. His gaze dropped to the crevasse and he walked slowly toward it, dragging his feet through the powdery snow and feeling the armor scale down to his battered blue ankles.

No matter what he did, it kept growing. Even the heat of the sparks only exacerbated it.

But he was not weak, he reminded himself. After all he’d been through, after how stubbornly his magic fought him he had not given in to it, avoiding hurting people and causing trouble as it seemed wont to do. There was no other way to end it, he told himself. He had to beat it before he ended up hurting Sophie, too, and Manny knew she was expecting it.

He set the staff over his knee, and brought it down with all his might on the armor, watching the sparks explode and then disappear as the worn wood splintered.


	10. Full Circle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Back to where it all began.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nah, but dem update times.

It was an uncomfortable déjà vu, Jack lingering in the crevasse. Pitch was of course aware of his presence the moment he approached the monolith, sand vibrating with the crackling energy.

Was it a peace offering?

Was he baiting him?

Pitch had been successfully avoiding him for a good while, had nearly cleared his thoughts and assimilated himself with the mindless shadows, before he felt the staff break. Jack’s weakness bowled over him in thick, sweet waves, the fear and self-loathing spicing the air of the caves with something that left him salivating. The Guardians were increasingly wary. His appetite was growing again and Jack was lost to them.

Truly, it would have been the perfect time for an attack; to piece himself together and wash his memory of three years spent in heavenly exile. He was strong enough now, with Jack’s many blind tempests and unpredictable storms, to step out into the moonlight, even. This had been his fastest recovery in history. A little over a decade and back in the saddle. But it was more a chore than anything to let himself enjoy it, and the slow conquest lacked his signature presentation. The cavern, though desolate, finally gained enough comfort to be called a “home,” even if what made it so was only haunting the Antarctic entrance. Leaving to direct his growing army, to plan his ultimate escape from this planet had become vague, tiresome tasks. He could barely take the idea of leaving seriously, not with what he’d buried, here.

Part of him sizzled at the thought of staying, the part that composes the fibers of his body; the shadows, countless and shrieking. He was unsure of what made him so aloof, and why he couldn’t pick himself up after the last few blows Jack had dealt. Because it was his fault, wasn’t it? Pitch was only meant to be involved for one step of the process, but now he’d been barraged by all that Jack’s brought on him.

He couldn’t even rouse anger—he was drained.

He briefly entertained the concept of depression, but it was such a pathetic thing that he could barely stand the word. After all, he’d already lost a child, befo—

No.

 _He_ never lost anything.

The other part of him. The part that knew to call the rabbit “Aster.”

Touching his forehead revealed fine beads of sweat. He leaned into the globe and steadied himself, grasping the wrought metal with pale knuckles. The din in his head grew into a demoniac frenzy, and his tumult filled the caves with a poisonous black fog. He felt it seeping from his fingertips, wet with blood against Jack’s beautiful stained thigh, Jack’s sweet screeches cloying his brain until white pricks of light speared his retinas—

His eyelids shocked open to find the cavern empty and still, just as he’d left it. So maybe his head was a little funny, right then. Reabsorbing the magic he’d spent for so long on… the boy… it _is_ a bit much to take in at once. The flow has been stoppered and he was resuming normal function. The caves were disorienting, after all. It would be best to get a breath of fresh air.

Scratching a scab felt much the same. He was near the Antarctic entrance in a breath, tapping aside the massive frozen wall hiding his sanctum. But when he entered the luminous blue world, Jack was nowhere to be seen.

Only a few splinters of wood, one slightly larger than the others, were left scattered on the snow.

 

* * *

 

Bunny is the only one who could possibly know what it was that brought Jack to this state, but it was North who’d kept an eye on him as the storms swept the coasts. They interfered with his work. When he stumbled upon the crevasse, after scouring the globe for the last of the hideous tempests, he wasn’t sure what he’d found. Jack looked more like a sculpture than a human, a macabre vision of otherworldly beauty. His skin was translucent and blue, with thinly scaled armor clawing up his throat and jaw, already covering all limbs. The staff was beyond North’s abilities to repair, but he gathered as many pieces as could be found, and took Jack in his arms like the child he was.

After several hours in a heated room, the armor disintegrated, and Jack’s white flesh gained a dusky violet hue. His eyes opened, but he remained mostly catatonic, regardless of whatever treats or toys or conversation were enthusiastically offered. North had never seen him with the staff broken, and was constantly frightened about what might happen if he lacked a conduit too long. Young nature spirits are fickle creatures, and Jack one of the newest. Without magic, North had no certainty that he would survive.

It took a few months, but eventually Jack got out of bed. He cut his hair and North sewed up an outfit similar to the one he’d mysteriously lost. One evening he was there, but by morning he was gone. North assumed he’d stepped out during his work in the shop, and wondered why he hadn’t simply fixed the staff in the first place. It couldn’t have been that hard to do.

 

* * *

 

Pitch, against all better judgment (which seemed to be his default state, of late) decided to track the object of his obsessions, and shook with rage when he found him at the North Pole. Or he would have, if he even half-resembled the venomous creature he’d known himself to be. Instead, he passively tailed the boy to a lonely little room, and felt twice forsaken to see Jack readily (if blankly) accepting North’s fatherly doting. A shark had more expression in its eyes. Jack looked as dead as he was, and though Pitch would have hanged himself before admitting it hurt to see him so defenseless, he was drawn to the boy’s window trying to witness it, unable to enter for some fear he wouldn’t name.

Soon enough, Jack invited him. Like asking in the devil.

One night, after having languished silently in bed for several weeks, Jack shoved the covers off as well as he could manage, trudged heavily up to the window where Pitch lurked, supposedly invisible, slammed it open with a breathless tug, and wandered back to bed, falling in and turning his back to the open portal, the blankets kicked down so even his slender feet were bare.

Considering himself an intelligent and opportunistic being, Pitch was flustered to find himself stuck in the Limbo of the sill. The protective magic of Santofclaussen only worked on uninvited horrors; Jack had no fear or hatred of him that the wards could predict, and so the usual sting of formidable magic was entirely absent. That he could enter at all only meant that Jack wanted him there, and it confused him so terribly that he was too distracted to hear the creak of wood as his body slid over it, solidifying for some earthly comfort he was sure would be denied him. So for that night, he simply stayed near, and for the first time since he began haunting Jack’s dark window, watched the boy’s back rise more and more slowly, and his breath even into the sound rhythm of dreamless sleep.

Come morning, the window was closed before North could see, and Jack tucked in and dead-eyed as before. Night after night passed, Pitch lurking silently in the corners, rigging shadows under the bed to monitor Jack’s sleep and pull him deeper if he started to stir. Within two weeks, the room itself grew darker, and the ill circles beneath Jack’s eyes sank tenderly into his skull, the skin on his face waxy and fragile, as though touching it would cause it to burst. North noticed the lingering shadows and tinkered with the wards, but nothing he could do would disperse them, and Jack’s general situation did not seem any worse for their presence.

Another night passed, the air at the Pole unusually crisp and calm. Barren. Jack actually shivered in bed, tugging at his soiled nightgown and revealing a creamy shoulder. Pitch felt the air surge out of his lungs at the rare sight and froze transfixed, scared to move as his hunger roiled and cried for relief after a year of profound starvation.

He stepped close enough to slowly draw the blankets over Jack’s trembling body, lingering as he regained his breath and took advantage of their closeness, feasting on the sight of his desire, on Jack as some dream he wouldn’t touch shook his back. It finally woke him in tears. Pitch was well beneath the bed by then, and fell into a strange daze listening to Jack’s stifled weeping. Jack never liked to share his weaknesses, much like himself. They were a match made in hell and nothing could comfort Pitch more; Jack was _made_ for him. As each night came, he grew bolder, working to reclaim what he conveniently wrote off as his territory, and came to stand or sit at Jack’s bedside, watching over his sleep, shamefully grateful and greedy for the warmth of the other’s unconscious company.

But he moved too quickly for Jack’s liking, and one night gathered enough courage to touch him. Just a brush of his fingertips with his breath sucked in, worshipfully ghosting the silvery surface of an angelic cheek. Jack squirmed and woke to find him leaning over, eyes shining and mouth open in an empty breath, tense; unsure. Without really looking at him, which vexed him almost to striking the boy, Jack murmured in a gravelly voice,

“ _Go home._ ”

Then he turned over, and tried to sleep.

Pitch couldn’t have that, so he leaned in closer, antagonizing to get a proper reaction, knee pressing down upon the bed with his full weight, climbing closer to Jack’s lovely side. The sting of his cheek was the first thing he noticed, then Jack’s feet curling as he hunched against the headboard, shivering, arms up in defense and eyes shining shallowly, mirthless. Jack had slapped him.

Not knowing what to do, and acting on vengeful instinct more than he should have, Pitch grabbed at the boy’s wrists and tugged him to the edge of the bed, savoring every jolt of cool skin against his own as Jack’s savage kicks dug into his robe.

“ _After **you**._ ”

His voice was colder than he meant it to be, but Jack was downright vicious to insinuate that the dank caverns could be anything more without his presence. And he must have known it, Pitch reasoned. He must have understood the destruction he’d wrought, and done so intentionally. Pitch allowed him to curl into the blankets once more, left the last shards of the staff on the nightstand, and exited with a mighty slam of the window. The shadows informed him of Jack’s departure the next night, but following that, the boy disappeared. He didn’t come home. Perhaps Pitch should have been more sincere about his demand.

 

* * *

 

Belief is so essential to their being, it’s a wonder it isn’t better understood among the Guardians. Time seems to have dulled their appreciation of it rather than refined it, taking for granted the daily flow of curious power. It is not clear that even the Man in the Moon knows quite what constitutes the power of belief, where it comes from, and when it should be snuffed out, only that it is born in the heart of a child. The last beat may be the true end of belief. Jack had not had any lasting contact with children in several years, when Jamie’s life ended abruptly, unceremoniously. He only felt the sudden widening of the cavern in his heart, the gasp of a last breath as he slid gracelessly beneath the clouds and plummeted toward the Earth’s surface—no tunnel of light, but the brief darkness of concussion to herald the next stage of his everlasting life.

Jamie was dead.

The first and only human he’d loved since his sister, and his first believer.

He feels Jamie’s death penetrate his bones, creep through his dark, sluggish blood; feels the tug of air through a tube sputter and still in his lungs, or thinks he does. The next few minutes are spent gasping and crying in the small crater he’d made, wondering why he hadn’t gone to see Jamie again, why the past few years won’t leave him alone, when the uncompromising shadows of twilight begin to lengthen, and his old nemesis steps from behind a withered birch. They strangle the last of the forest sounds, riding luxuriously in the mute furrows of snow and driving off songbirds for acres. Jack continues crying, too used to the cling stalking shadows and the full space under his bed to be alarmed.

Pitch is still unprepared, seeing Jack like this, still finds him lovely, and still feels terrible heartache. He hasn’t spoken to anyone, even his mares, in months, so language is heavy in his throat, and his voice deep with disuse. But he sounds soothing, even so, and approaches Jack calmly, silently, and asks him almost as quietly as the snow itself,

“ _Well?_ ”

 

* * *

 

And so things have come full circle. Jack stirs in the great grey bed, limbs willowy beneath the satin sheets, drawing elegant contours among the swirling folds. This is not the same room that they had shared, that Pitch had tried and failed to avoid for the past year. In spite of his best efforts of sealing it, he had unwillingly seeped in and stood over Jack’s empty nest, longing to doze among the dozens of cushions, now steadily losing his mate’s scent.

This is a different room, one Pitch devised on the spot to accommodate Jack’s newfound infirmness. The boy struggled when they’d dropped below the surface, senses suddenly heightened by memories flooding back in. Of course, on instinct, Pitch had first directed them toward the room, some part of him rejoicing at their definite reunion, but Jack had squirmed so horribly, tears pricking his eyes at the thought of it, that Pitch diverted and brought them to an alcove, shadows clumping hastily together to form scant furniture. Gently depositing his prized cargo, Pitch hurried to summon some form of light, snapping back almost instantly into the days of Jack’s pregnancy, when he’d begged for candles or anything that could simulate sunlight, another odd craving. It wasn’t until he was already on his way back to their old room that he realized the candles were not for such a purpose, and that he was doing his **enemy** a _favor_.

It would have been very easy to think like that, but he returned with candles, nonetheless, and hurriedly lit them to give Jack some small comfort.

He knew he didn’t like the darkness.

But he must have interrupted some private moment, because Jack clamped a hand over his mouth as the fire took, and the weak flame revealed tear tracks lining his violet cheeks. He noticed at once the clumsily-clipped locks sticking to the sweat on his forehead, no longer brushing his ears and eyelashes; the last sign of his fertility carelessly snipped away. It should anger him, but something else wells up, something that mirrors Jack’s quieting sobs too well, and he keeps just out of reach of the light, dwarfing its influence with thick shadows. He does not trust himself to remain calm, not with his fingers itching and heart racing. Jack is home.

Jack is _home_.

“… Why did you bring me here?”

He starts at how hoarse the voice is, as though the boy hasn’t spoken since their last encounter. First responses will fail him, so he checks himself carefully, controlling his tone and the slight irritation that creeps into him. Of course he’d brought him _here_. He _belongs_ here.

“You needed a place to rest.” His eyes wander over to the forsaken staff, a wicked crack lying bare where he must’ve painstakingly reattached it. “I see you’ve mended it.”

Jack gazes into the candle, eyeing the furniture Pitch has summoned, but not too closely. Shadows stretch across the surfaces, straining to hold their form under Pitch’s riotous thoughts. They reach maddeningly toward Jack as he unconsciously thinks of keeping him here against his will, and Jack jerks back against the headboard, further from the light. Pitch's heart lurches and he hurriedly reigns in his clamoring thoughts, eagerly listening for his mate’s— _ex-_ mate’s own rapid heartbeat.

“I want to leave.”

_People in hell want ice water._

“You’re unwell.”

Jack reaches for the staff, but a shadow deftly intercepts him, drawing it into the darkness as the boy nearly jumps after it. But he falls at the edge of the bed, one arm shaking with tension as it holds him upright, the other curled against his chest, gripping his heart with white knuckles as he chokes. Pitch instinctively approaches him, trying to help him back into bed, but Jack jolts away in hatred and _fear_ , and everything in him stalls. His brow furrows and relaxes as the shadows in the furniture waver under the strain of his emotions, Jack’s yelp solidifying them and his attentions as he snaps out of his reverie. Tone curt, he addresses Jack with a hard stare,

“You may leave as soon as you can do it yourself.”

Then he disappears.

 

* * *

 

The voices are always louder around Jack, warring for his conscious will. Every shadow demands its own desires, until a thousand tortures and fantasies have lined the halls deepest within his mind, silent but for the dull hissing din, in eager wait of Jack’s exquisite screams. They battle something like a conscience, though Pitch is sure he’s never known one. Instinct, then. The war leaves his head pulsing, robes swaying with a tumultuous breeze, the caverns growing hotter under pressure of his decisions. He must keep Jack safe, must keep his hands clasped. He’s an intelligent enough creature to understand that what he wants cannot be taken from Jack by force, and that he may very well never again receive it. It angers him that he can’t figure which part of that statement most disturbs him.

Taking Jack for his own, using him toward whichever purposes the shadows deem worst is a constant thought. The voices harass him, mounting in personalities, until he finds his hands twitching needfully toward the movement they suggest, his unconscious wanderings through the caves inevitably leading him to Jack’s closed door with his fingers clenched around an invisible neck. A constant loop. Nothing he can escape.

It all goes back to Jack.

 

* * *

 

At its base, the candle is marked by strange carvings, creeping up the sides into spilt wax, a heavy smoke burning off the top into some soothing scent he’s never been able to place. Jack lies on his side, quiet, studying the wax as he had years before, memory invigorated by the calming fog permeating the room. Pitch satisfied his cravings so fretfully, unsure as any new father of what was necessary and what was a passing whim. Jack could hardly have told the difference. Each one hit him as if he’d die without it.

Sweater ridden up and revealing him to the soft candlelight, a hand found its place on his flat belly and hasn’t left since, occasionally stroking the soft white skin, a calming motion to match the scent subduing him. He stopped crying maybe half an hour before, salt of the tears encrusted on his face, eyes heavy in his head. Sleeping in the lair of the Nightmare King sounds like the perfect way to get himself killed, but he’d rarely had a nightmare down here, before. He’s fairly sure he wouldn’t start, now, nor that Pitch would find any reason to attack him.

Being near Pitch for so long lent him a certain understanding of the other’s subtleties. He knows how Pitch moves, how the shadows stir ecstatically with his presence. When the candle flickers with their energy, he doesn’t think twice.

“Why this room?” he asks calmly, watching the smoke drift haltingly up into the black canopy. His mind is hazy for it, tongue moving too easily. Pitch lingers somewhere in the corner, frozen at having been discovered. “You could have put me in the other one.”

“You resisted.”

“Hasn’t stopped you, before.”

_Oh, yes it has._

A corporeal body nears the bed, face just out of reach of the dim light. Jack closes his eyes and sleepily inhales, unsure if the hand he feels stroking back his hair is real or memory. He doesn’t fight it, but when he opens his eyes, Pitch’s hands are clasped tensely behind his back, and the feeling unravels with a thread of longing.

This particular candle has only ever affected Jack, that he’s noticed. Perhaps it’s something about him having been human, and Pitch being whatever makes a Nightmare King. Thinking becomes easier and harder; thoughts unmarred by stinging emotion or physical dolor, but dreamy, susceptible to fantasy; suggestive. His gaze climbs up Pitch’s statuesque front, clawing over the gap at the neckline wantonly. A part of him is glad he can’t move quite well. Were he able, he might do something he’d desperately regret.

“Are you feeling better?” Pitch asks of him, well aware of the effect the candle is having. Jack doesn’t answer.

His eyes remain closed for several seconds, and when they open, the faint film of sleep is cast over them, pulling strongly on his lids. They dart up once to try and face Pitch, shoulders sliding into a position to rise, but gravity is too much, and he curls into his failure, eyes drooping closed once more. A puff of breath leaves him, voice drowsy and helpless,

“It’s a mean trick, pulling that out.” His limbs buzz pleasurably, as right after a massage, and the exhaustion of his crying leaves him deadweight on the blanket. Pitch pauses, then sits haltingly on the bed, next to him. Jack can just barely decipher the curve of his thigh against the candlelight, flickering again with the stress of the shadows permeating the room.

“You’re thinking something awful.”

“ _I am?”_

Jack curls more tightly as fingers brush his choppy bangs. He’s fairly sure they’re real, this time.

“I can always tell.”

Pitch leans in closer to him, and he swears he’s being pet; feels the stirrings of rage beneath the dark sea of comfort, the currents leaden his limbs until he can hardly twitch.

“If you touch me, I’ll hate you forever.”

He hears a breath pause, the thigh near his head tensing, weighing the options. Pitch rises off the bed and adjusts Jack so he’s lying on the pillow, face still unreadable through the thick darkness. Jack closes his eyes as a hand sweeps over them, leaving nightmare sand in its wake. He’s already asleep, but hears the words echo in his descent,

_No. You won’t._


	11. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you want an epilogue, you'll have to say it.  
> This story is SO DONE FINALLY HAHAHAAAAHHHHohmyhead

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prepare thyself... for FEELS.

Jack has a nightmare like none other and wakes nearly in tears, mainly for the reason that some years ago, it would have been a sweetly satisfying, comforting dream. In it, Pitch crept into his room, spanning the anxious shadows crusted stiffly to the walls. Warmth built in the stagnant air and Jack sidled from beneath the dark satin sheets, splaying his limbs to a welcoming heat, sweat slowly lining his bare white thighs. Pitch swept over him like smoke, only the faintest traces of nervous hands on his cheeks, reverently stroking the rosy flesh and solidifying by the second.

“ _Pitch,_ ” Jack rasped, and Pitch made a face like he’d shot him, shocked and rigid, before lowering himself with careful breaths, casting his black form over the body offered. Jack’s arms were stranded above his head and Pitch drove shadows up the muscle, sliding in covetous embrace around his wrists and circling the forearm in constrictive spirals. Jack arched into the rare touch, body sore and thin from his isolation; the dissipating belief in his lore. Shallow panting warmed his lips as Pitch descended, the nervous shudder of his arms quaking against Jack’s pale ribs. His disbelief was heartbreaking, but at last he touched Jack’s lips with his own and at the parting invitation instantly folded around him, mashing himself into the kiss and groaning in misery.

He pressed down hungrily, devouring everything Jack would give him, shadows twining ecstatically around their forms as he stirred and hesitantly began returning the affections, deepening the kiss and widening his legs hopefully. Pitch swirled in between them, too frightened and overwhelmed to maintain corporeality, slipping impatiently over his flesh and blending through it. His groans became desperate as he pulled away, unable to sustain himself long enough for a simple kiss. Jack smiled and kissed him softly on his cheek, lightly enough that the translucent barrier of shadow swept away with his lips, smudging him with darkness, and Pitch was grateful and lonely and showing everything in him that Jack had sowed, each emotion he’d steadfastly ignored, and the inevitable terror that accompanied the revelation left his limbs weak and shaking.

“ _It’s okay,_ ” Jack whispered, closing his legs with a snort at Pitch’s brokenhearted expression. “ _We can try again later_.”

And he _hoped_.

-

He’d successfully avoided Jack’s dreams for years, now, and there was no reason to go delving in just now that they’d reunited. It was not worth all the dreamsand on Earth to see what brought that gleam to Jack’s eyes. Pitch is still unsure of how to act around him. The voices grow and wither in his presence, vying for dominance, forming factions based on torture, straining his voice and bringing noticeable tension to his form. Shadows stop writhing and sharpen, meaning to nick him but only passing uselessly through his body. The balance of form has shifted, and now they have physical being. Perhaps it’s for the better, since Pitch is uncomfortably at odds with himself around Jack, and infuriatingly unsure of what he wants, although instinct shouts more clearly, more frantically at him every time he visits Jack’s makeshift room.

Arousal is not something he’s felt in years, and he’s certain Jack would have none of it; likely leave if he found out. Fortunately, the boy is wearing more than the shift he’d donned at Santoffclaussen. It would be wonderfully simple to have just pulled the tie, and watch that marvelous body reveal itself.

Not entirely consciously, Pitch initiates a vacillating courting period, during which he both avoids Jack for days and leaves gifts for him similar to the ones he’d given during his pregnancy. Sweets, phials of pure dreamsand to help him sleep, candles, recorded shadow puppets that would play for him when he was bored, and the occasional pillow, which he made sure to steal from very nice homes on the surface, and never defile the still nest in the belly of the caverns.

Though, in avoiding Jack, he increasingly spends his time there.

And Jack, it’s obvious, is becoming lonely, and eager to leave or at least start talking to him, to gauge what they have left and see if any of it is worth salvaging. Pitch involuntarily hopes. When he receives the candles, he keeps them in stock by his bed, but tries not to light them too often, thinking they’ll ward off Pitch like a nightlight (which have never worked). The sweets make him drool as North’s never had, and while Pitch unconsciously puffs up at the thought of being superior to another, Jack greedily devours the candies and fruits, wiping his mouth happily, the sad silver gleam in his eyes fading for a moment or two.

The dreamsand is used more than Pitch would like, since Jack appears to enjoy sleeping more than anything, and phial after phial disappears, like bottles of morphine. Pillows have an odd meaning between them, and were too private a gift, Pitch thought, at this stage, and he was nearly tearing his hair out, (if he could only get a physical grip on himself) when Jack finally stopped staring at it, grabbed a nearly-empty phial, and cuddled the pillow as he immediately passed out. The sight punches the air out of him. He stands over the bed for several hours, trying to come to terms with himself, get a grip on his hope and calculate what to do next, but nothing can move him, not any of the thousands of voices screaming at him to take scythe in hand and snuff Jack out. Not even when Jack wakes, eyeing him warily and instantly alert, grains of sleep heavily crusting his eyes, is he swayed into action.

Jack slowly rises, the slick sheets falling around him, revealing the tempting curves of his milky legs. His lips are dry and Pitch inwardly snaps at himself to break the spell.

“I need to see it.” He blinks, brow furrowing slightly, Jack’s posture straightening as he shakes off sleep. Words register sluggishly, his brain grinding ruthlessly against remembrance, and he looks toward the burnt-out candle, melted to the base.

He wants to refuse, but yearns for company in his knowledge and sorrow. Offering a gentlemanly hand, he winces when Jack accepts him, and draws the boy off the bed.

Shadows fold into a portal of stairs and they descend quietly, Jack a few steps behind, Pitch eager to look back and see the fear on his face. Via the shadows, he can feel the lines of worry and determination, and cradles Jack worshipfully through the miasma. Colder and colder, the stairs lead finally to the stone arch, a thin veil of fog gently rolling across the floor, disturbed into soundless waves by their steps. Jack grimaces at the spot where the mirror once stood, breezing past it with a hard stare into Pitch’s shoulder blades, ahead of him. Control begins to fail him as they near their old bedroom, and his breaths deepen, eyes blinking more quickly to stifle his weakness, but his heart is steely and he must do this.

Pitch glances behind him,

“There’s not much to see,” he tries in a passive tone, begging for Jack to continue and at once having no desire to visit the grave. Jack is stony, the darkness under his eyes grim. They continue.

The bedchamber is freezing, pillows untouched, the blankets tossed exactly as Jack had left them when Bunny had come. He stares after it with confused emotions, hand rigid in Pitch’s hold as he’s led into another patch of darkness. Nightmares tread the ceiling, glaring down at them with glinting yellow eyes.

“ _Stars_ ,” Jack murmurs, and Pitch’s shoulders stiffen. They wind around a massive stone column, reaching a granite balustrade looming over a great abyss. Stray beams of light stream into the drop-off, choked by passing nightmares swerving along a deep black tide. Staring into it gives Jack a headache. He’s sure he can make out faces in the bleak, but they swallow each other and redouble. More distressing, the darkness seems to tug along beside the two of them, and he swears for a second he can make out teeth, but the glimmer might also be sand, and the room is too vast to sanely search.

Once they pass another arch into a chamber, Jack stumbles at a sudden release of pressure. He hadn’t noticed the weight around his neck or the tiny myriad scratches on his ankles, hadn’t felt them at all. He huffs a few generous breaths and rubs the sore bruise on his throat. Pitch makes to pause, but Jack recovers quickly, and he hurries forward again, avoiding an explanation.

While the rest of the cavern rumbles with underground rivers, and hisses with whatever Pitch has down here, this area is entirely silent, and rightfully eerie. Jack’s hackles go up and he clenches the hand in front of him, grimacing at the stiffness in it. Pitch was supposed to be heated; chaotic, always moving. Jack was the cold one, the dead one. He doesn’t like the change but focuses on it because if he doesn’t keep his mind occupied, he’ll start thinking about where they’re going. He’s not even sure why he suggested it; in no way does he feel ready.

Hours seem to pass as they walk along this corridor. It has no visible ceiling, and the massive pillars around them are of all different cultures. He spies Egyptian hieroglyphs and Nordic runes, and small black things scurrying up the sides.

Pitch’s breathing changes as they come upon a large gate. It’s too dim, this far back, for Jack to discern its make, but he gropes curiously at the freezing façade and discovers tiny, intricate carvings, varying textures smooth and not, and a long bar holding it shut. He finally registers that Pitch has stopped for a reason, and that the change of pace in his breaths is measured, careful. His hand retracts immediately, scalded by fear as the gate’s meaning hits him. A small part of him wants to make a crack about cemetery gates, about how Pitch’s best efforts in horror are always campy, but all his blood has pooled in the scratches on his feet, and he’s hypersensitive to the grind of metal as Pitch slowly opens the gate.

They face a massive wall of ice, ethereal blue and dimly illuminated by the light of a deep crevasse on the other side. The chamber cannot be seen from it. A soft blue glow bathes the smooth white stone of the chamber floor, fine lines between the bricks angling in long spokes toward the centre. Jack’s body is in rigor, the lines drawing his sight toward a circle of stone, the surface enamelled in brilliant stars of all colours, streaked with gold and stardust. His breathing escalates as a hand softly touches his lower back, unsure but inflexible, soundlessly urging him forward. A pained grunt leaves him as they begin walking toward the circle, and the patterns become more detailed, more fantastical. Pieces of tile, cut glass, and polished gems no larger than his finger garnish the lid of the tomb, a small lip of polished marble standing an inch above all sides. His heart sinks through his belly and he panics for a moment that he might not be able to walk. Three years of hope, ten of ashes. The stardust shuffles along the gold, causing the tiles to shimmer, and only when that catches his eye does he realize that the configuration is turning, the stars slowly following a smooth orbit.

He wants to say it’s beautiful, and for some reason to tell Pitch he’s sorry, but the thought of what lies beneath it freezes him on the spot.

“Jack,” Pitch calls softly, squeezing his hand and urging from him some of the tenderness they’d lost. Jack covers his mouth and starts crying, breathing heavily through his palm but stifling it bravely. It does him no good, and the sobs grow, shaking his back until his knees waver and Pitch gently leads him to the floor.

Everything is buried here. Everything between them; their child, their life, and things only Jack can see; Jamie, his role as a Guardian. It all whirls together and Jack frees his pain only to see it echoed. Beside him, Pitch’s eyes are red and staring holes into the wall of ice before them. The lids are wet, but his lips don’t even quiver. Jack catches his attention and he grows bold, thumbing a tear from his cheek and brushing back crudely-cut hair. Words die in his mouth, but it remains open as if locked around them.

Touching more than he had in the past ten years, Jack brushes his cheek and stiffens when Pitch instantly leans into it, eyes shutting gratefully as his breath shudders out. Losing strength, Pitch slides down further and Jack widens his hold, hesitant hands hugging Pitch close as he crumples uselessly into his lap.

Though Jack never hears a thing, he is overcome by a vicious, dreamy déjà-vu, racked by the shiver of Pitch’s back against him, and lets him go for as long as he needs. Jack’s own emotions seem to have dried up. They’d ruled him for so long and left his life barren. He accepts Pitch’s weakness as his own, and their closeness puts energy and care in his motions that he hasn’t possessed in years. Pitch’s back stops after long, and a hand creeps up to grip Jack’s shirt. Pitch has sprawled comfortably in his lap, but now rises to his knees, eyes bloodshot and desperate. He holds his grip at the neck of Jack’s sweater, pulling it down just slightly, steadied by Jack’s own hands soon cradling it.

“ _… please…_ ” he whispers hoarsely, but never makes a request. Jack’s discomfort grows and that seems to wake Pitch. He looks down at the shapes and colours moving freely of their dolour and his composure returns, although there remains in his eyes a distinct red tint. The tense curl of his back relaxes into stately posture, and his gaze drifts back to the tomb. He’s still holding Jack’s hand, and the hot sweat almost stings, but Jack doesn’t refuse him. The whiteness of Pitch’s knuckles makes them tremble, and though his figure is still and sombre, Jack can tell that all of his anger and sorrow is going into that one, shaking grip.

He’s sure of what he’s denied Pitch, but uncertain of whether it was right.

After several minutes, Pitch gains the energy to stand, hoisting Jack up with him almost as an afterthought.

“I’ll take you back to your room,” he says distantly, without facing the boy. Jack’s shoulders go rigid, like he’s about to say something important, and Pitch readily gives him his full attention. When he says nothing, Pitch turns away with perfect composure, as though he hadn’t expected Jack to have the courage.

Leaving the room is harder than he thought. The crystal stars move independently, unaware of his existence, continuing their slow climb and descent, whirling around the tomb. From this angle, the wall of ice glitters with their brilliant reflections, but doesn’t show his. Pitch is the only one who can make him feel real, at the moment, and he slides his hand more tightly around a stunned grey palm.

Jack wants to ask why they can’t use the portal back up, frightened of encountering whatever had injured him on that abysmal terrace, but he remembers the silence of the tomb, and how none of the shadows entered alongside them. Knowing first-hand how essential they are to Pitch’s nature, he unthinkingly questions it, and is answered with sharp nails struggling not to elongate, grazing his skin with supressed emotion.

“They do not respect the same boundaries that we do.” He says distractedly, and Jack is sure that they’re fighting inside him, right now.

“… they don’t like me down here, do they?” Jack continues in the first real conversation they’ve had in forever. Pitch emits an odd sound; choked and small, a little like a laugh, but covers it by clearing his dry throat, rasping quietly,

“Actually, they love it.”

Jack doesn’t know what that means, but the steely silence that follows assures him it’s not good.

To his dismay and fear, they do not avoid the open room, and that same blackness gazes into Jack’s soul. His ears buzz and he swears he can hear a scratching sound, like claws inside his skull, but searching the vastness for answers only leaves him with a terrible headache, and as soon as they exit, he finds scratches on his wrists and hands, too.

Their old room is the hardest to pass. The light fog is comforting and Jack actually stops, releasing Pitch’s hand to do it and staring intensely into the pile of pillows and blankets, still faintly smelling of their union, although Jack is sure it must be an illusion. Pitch stands a little ahead of him, waiting, when Jack makes toward the sunken bed, and he springs into a scream,

“ _DON’T—!_ ”

He yanks Jack breathlessly away from the treasure, eye wet again and frustration tying his tongue. Shocked by the outburst and insulted from being denied something that for several years was _his_ , stubbornness wins out, and Jack thrusts off Pitch’s clawing grasps, toe just touching the first step.

“I’ll **break** it.” Jack freezes and feels a heart-dropping pressure. Turning to see Pitch holding his staff, he pauses, pulse quickening at the thought of the pain that would naturally follow. With all the practiced diffidence of an immortal teenager, he evenly replies,

“It’s not like you haven’t done it before.” And he makes to step down, when talons dig painfully into his shoulder and effortlessly rip him back into a stone wall. Pitch tosses the staff the floor, defending the endangered nest with flaring nostrils and an inhuman grimace. Jack’s breath is knocked out of him and he can hardly believe what’s happened. He slowly regains his bearings and uses the staff to prop up his injured body. The sweater North gave him has a long, bloody tear, and the thought of it sends him into a rage.

To his credit, Pitch is able to protect the old room, directing their fight out toward the balustrade, pushing Jack with calculated force. This is his element and Jack is unstable. Jack has been unstable for ten years and every time it looks like he has a chance, something else happens. Another short tragedy. Another death. He’s tired and angry and Pitch is _not_ helping.

The cave groans pleasurably with their fight and in his fury, Jack can finally discern crude, leering faces among the roiling shadows. Pitch pursues him mercilessly, and it would have been easy to shove him off into the dark abyss, to parry an attack and swing Jack off the stone rail, but he makes every effort to keep him safe from the teeth and glares and monstrous smirks, sending each blow back toward the wall, trying to herd Jack away from certain danger.

Jack stops fighting. He’s panting and thrumming with energy, lips bloodied and eyes wild, but he restrains himself. Pitch has never been totally upfront with him, has always had some secondary agenda that Jack couldn’t know, and even here, he can’t really get him to fight. He can’t earn one shred of honesty or respect as an equal, can’t even dream of sharing what they had before, something vaguely resembling love. A sudden urge demands that he throw the staff into the gaping cavern, but he’s sure it’s not his, and when he resists, he feels pain wherever the shadows can reach.

Pitch can see it, and he doesn’t like it.

“ _We’re done here_ ,” he gasps with beastly breaths, avoiding Jack’s stare and opening a portal the shadows too happily provide. He stalks forward and Jack nearly spears him, but instead of attacking, he folds his arms in suffocating pressure around the boy’s struggling form, and falls back through the portal.

-

They appear in the forest and Jack instantly hits at him, choking at the grip and kicking with all his might until he’s freed. Pitch stumbles back, long black coat torn at the edges, the smoky black of his fingertips similar to frostbite. Jack blinks through tears and grits his teeth.

_Black. Swollen. Frozen into place._

_“Don’t ignore me,”_

_“ **Ready for another?** ”_

“Clearly, this isn’t working.”

Jack jolts out of his reverie, looking up to find Pitch smoothing the frayed edges of his cloak, the high silver collar around his neck tarnished with black smudges. Jack cuddles his staff and purses his lips as Pitch grooms his robe of falling snow, brushing it off and eventually letting it fall through him altogether. Nothing cold to mar his beauty.

“Have you anything to say?” His tone isn’t harsh, but it’s unnaturally guarded. The sunken pouches beneath his eyes must have been painful to earn, and Jack understands that, but he’s still _so angry._

“… I’m angry.” He says simply, not trying anymore. Pitch lifts his chin and snorts,

“You’re _angry?_ How awful. Is there anything I can do?”

Sarcasm is another way of healing, albeit an ineffective one. Jack nods as if Pitch were taking him seriously, for once.

“Yeah, I’m angry. How do you feel?”

Pitch starts and that awful, loathing grin slides into doubt. The furious glitter of his eyes dissipates with a pained glare before evaporating into apathy. He regards Jack with what he hopes is indifference, but the grate of his voice is painful, and his stare too grave,

“I suppose I’m angry, too.”

“That’s good,” Jack tries, answered with the curious quirk of an elegant brow. “It’s good that we’re both angry, I mean. We’re on the same page. For once.”

Pitch forgets to close his mouth and stares openly before laughing, hunching slightly and covering his mouth, barking both mocking and desolate,

“And look how far we’ve come! Are you still lonely? Still weak?!” He’s trying to be mean and failing. It pains him to see that Jack is still suffering, and that, in turn, feeds into that suffering. He starts pacing in a calm, steady circle, steps floating just above the snow, stifling his manic laughter with the choked breaths of a broken rib.

“Takes one to know one.” Pitch freezes and glares, but whatever playful malice he’d intended to summon fizzles before he can fire it, and his gaze becomes vacant and cool.

“Will you go back to it all, then? Romp around with brats in the snow, lick the Guardians’ boots?”

_Is that what you really want?_

Jack ponders theatrically and shakes his head, inviting the same drama they’d enjoyed long ago, “I don’t think it can go back to how it was,” his voice cracks and Pitch shivers, looking for all the world like he wants to hold him, but remains chained some yards away, “but I’m going to see what I can make of this. And I’d like to see what you’ll do, too.” Pitch watches the trees, far enough from the pond that he can’t see it, but reminded by everything around them of what happened here.

“… I want to know something.”

Recognition flares hesitantly on Pitch’s face and he regards Jack from his periphery. Sweeping a hand through the growing darkness of twilight, he acquiesces,

“Go on. Ask away.”

Jack considers his question and the weight of it bears heavily, slumping his shoulders fearfully, a fear that scares _Pitch_ and makes his heart quake, until he hardens and stands tall, and Pitch is left, in his own opinion, completely defenceless.

“I love you.”

Pitch can’t hear anything for a moment, and Jack’s in similar straits. The powerful flow of blood rushing in their ears deafens them to the calm snowy evening, but Jack does not crumple; he does not surrender to himself.

“I love you,” he says more firmly, skittish when Pitch instinctively steps back as though wounded. He continues in a stronger voice, “and I need to hear how you feel, too.”

Pitch cannot back away from this. Jack can’t sense fear, but the riotous skitter of shadows at the base of his cloak defines his conflict. Beyond that, Pitch looks _terrified_ , like Jack has just stabbed him in the chest and tried to rip out his organs. For the longest time, Jack has been so focused on himself and his own pain, ignorant and even hateful of Pitch’s, that he hasn’t bothered to recognize that it has been their sole connection for a decade. And he abandoned Pitch, and left him to deal with corpses and leftover fear because that is what Pitch _does_.

Now, whether Jack is more mature, or simply exhausted, he will not keep fighting. Nor will he surrender to weakness. He is adamant in closing this chapter in his life, and he needs Pitch to tell him how it ends; if there is anything that can continue.

Pitch doesn’t respond, so Jack steps forward and he steps back hastily, chest thrumming with shallow breaths and an abundance of fear. The shadows feed on and into it, until he’s too distracted to deny them or sense anything beyond the increasing doubt that this is one of many illusions the shadows have played out for him, and Jack is lying and will leave him because Jack _always_ leaves, and he’s never cared enough even to protect himself, let alone his _mate_ and their _child_ —

“Pitch.”

Jack is in front of him, hand on his gaunt grey cheek, lips violet and soft with the ghost of a smile. He knew the answer twelve years ago, he bloody _knew_ it and there’s no reason in saying it since he’s just going to _leave—_

“Pitch, I love you.”

Pitch breaks with a short sigh, grips a delicate white wrist, reaching out to Jack’s face and touching it reverently. He tries to be stoic, but his voice is wrecked and he’s never been more grateful or uncertain in his eternal life,

“I love _you_ —”

The dam bursts and before he can stop, he’s gasping and crying, eyes wide and delicate, waiting for Jack to cackle and tell him he’s lying, for the snow to whip into a blizzard and leave him stranded on the surface, vulnerable to all the wrath of the people who hate him, but Jack smiles and it’s blinding. He’s crying too, saying that he was an idiot, that he wished he’d been less selfish, and all sorts of after-the-fact hogwash, but Pitch barely hears any of it. He clenches the coarse fabric of the worn blue sweater, back bent horrendously as he hides his face thankfully in Jack’s neck. The embrace is returned and he cries harder, blissful for the pressure of loving arms and not the vile clawing of voracious shadows.

Suddenly Jack’s laughing and pleading with him to stop, and Pitch realizes he’s been saying it over and over, gripping Jack tighter, selfish, jealous of everything in the world, wanting his existence affirmed above all others.

“It’s okay, it’s okay! You’re okay,” Jack breathes through his giggles, eyes shining and the most wonderful sky-blue. Pitch moans wretchedly and kisses him, smothering his sobs to do it and coming away gasping. His hands creep into a vice around Jack’s form, wrapping almost twice over and pressing so hard he can barely breathe, but still he replies _I love you, I love you, too_ , and Pitch bites into his neck and groans at the taste of Jack’s sweat and skin, the flare of bruises and the little fingers clenching his robe in shock and pleasure.

“Oh! Hey, _ahn_ , not here, not… mmph, not yet. _Piiitch_ …!” Jack wilts a little, whether from the crushing pressure or Pitch’s vicious assault on his neck, he can’t tell. He hasn’t heard that voice in ten years and it’s sweeter and hotter than he’d often imagined it.

“Pitch!” Jack shoves him away and Jack is _not allowed to do that, anymore_ , “Pitch, ugh, just… gimme five minutes! Five minutes to say my piece and then we’ll do anything you want!”

Pitch pulls away, lips bloody in his ardour, and his eyes are criminally intense, “Anything?” he pants. Jack looks away with a fading smile and laughs awkwardly,

“Not… anything. Not yet. But… please. Just lemme talk. That’s… all I want to do, really.”

In spite of the sinking mood, Jack laughs again at Pitch’s wounded lust, the sad gleam in his eyes as he accepts defeat but never relinquishes his hold. Jack breathes with his eyes closed and when they open, they’re shining too much to be happy. Pitch whines because _that is not acceptable_ , and makes to kiss him again, but skinny arms hold him at bay, and he’s forced in increasing fear to listen to whatever terms Jack demands with the helpless knowledge that he’ll inevitably agree to them.

“I… this isn’t over. I mean, what happened. It’s not,” his knuckles tense around Pitch’s cloak and he looks into the trees to gain his footing, “… it’s not gonna _go away_.” One tear spills over and Jack’s back shakes. Pitch holds him steady, ready to attack the second Jack is done.

“I just,” Pitch knows what he’s scared of, but knows that for whatever reason, to say it is to conquer it. “I don’t want to go through that… again. I don’t…” he hiccups, hanging his head and leaning back into Pitch’s enveloping arms, “I can’t do it. And I’m not… I’m not _fixed_ , yet, and I’m _sorry_ ,” he gasps, and Pitch is still and accepting, doing his best to ignore the screeching in his head that Jack’s regret is insincere.

“I’m so _sorry_ , _Pitch!_ ”

Pitch takes initiative and kisses Jack’s forehead, his cheeks, delving beside the fists rubbing childishly at blue eyes and kissing his nose and cheeks.

“I know you are. I’ve seen it, too. It’s alright. You’re alright, Jack.”

Jack wraps his arms over Pitch’s shoulders and sobs into his chest, on his tip-toes and slowly lifting into the air as Pitch floats them backward, kissing his face, neck, shoulders; anywhere not clothed. Jack cries at being forgiven, at being kissed, at finally getting what he’d dreamed of, and Pitch has already gone through all that and wants his own assurance, something to quiet the painful ringing in his head,

“Jack, let’s go home.”

The most Jack can do is nod at the moment, but he reaches up to grip the back of Pitch’s head, pulling him down into a wet, slow kiss. Pitch backs up toward the shadow of a towering pine, and once a portal has opened, he falls into the darkness, holding Jack tighter than the boy can return, and burrowing himself so deeply in Jack’s flesh, it hurts the both of them.

And for the first time since it all began, they go home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Th-th-th-th-th-that's all, folks!
> 
> Nah, but that's sap, yo, with a capital "ick!" I hope you got something out of this you can use. I know I did. Probably.

**Author's Note:**

> And remember kids, sticking your hand through someone's organs is fun AND safe.


End file.
